Once a Reston resident

Time to escape the city

It is getting close to time to abandon the Washington area for the summer.

It is pretty much an annual migration if you judge it from the Interstates that radiate out from Northern Virginia, Maryland, and DC.  They will soon be flowing to capacity to more reasonable spots.

It is hard to like the Washington area in the summer.  With crowded roads, plenty of funky looking air, and not much access to water where humans can swim, it is no wonder the bridges to the eastern shore strain each summer to keep the traffic flowing and that the NC Outer Banks are filled to capacity each summer with metro escapees.

While our Southern Outer Banks and the beaches of Emerald Isle are the same driving time as the Northern Outer Banks, we don't seem to get as many metro area folks.  Sometimes it is good to be off the beaten path.

However, given the importance of tourism to our economy, I believe the slogan on my latest tee-shirt , "Carteret County, A Secret to Share."  I think many people in the metro area would enjoy our less commercialized beaches.

There is no better place to escape the heat and stress of the city than the shores of Bogue Sound.  Some of us go even further and think it is a great place to live.

There are no more beautiful waters than the ones right here.

We willing share the beauty of Carteret County with folks for a few weeks during the summer, but the rest of the year it is all ours and the only competition would be the abundant wildlife, fish, and lots of shrimp.

This year's coastal tomato crop has added even another benefit.  With some luck I will extend the December 19 last tomato picking into January this year.

In the next week or so, we should be seeing those famous Bogue Sound watermelons to go along with the local corn.

Fresh fish, crabs, shrimp, local produce, and uncrowed beaches with warm clean water,  I don't think it gets much better than that.

No distractions

One things that I do really well is focus.  My wife is always amazed at how I can keep doing something with the world collapsing around me.

I have a built-in filter that I guess developed over many years in the corporate world.  When I worked for Apple, I learned to carefully select where to put my time and effort.  Once the selection was made, a lot of the work was just trying to stay on task.

When I worked in Reston I though initially that being away from wife and any effort to have family time in the evening would free me to do more focused work.

It actually turned out to be the opposite.  People who worked for me knew when I was in Reston.  I could almost roll from the bed to the chair by my computer.  Instant messaging and phone calls went far longer than when I was home in Roanoke.

On top of that being in Reston seemed to put me in the center of what was happening.  The Washington Post became an addiction.  Then there was the background noise, always traffic, plenty of airplanes, and sometimes sirens.  While that noise doesn't stop you from doing anything, it does work on you.

Even meals in Reston were more of a distraction.  It was harder to get to the grocery store, and going out to a meal was far more complex and expensive than in Roanoke.

The pictures in this post were taken this morning on the White Oak River where I went kayaking before breakfast.

There were no distractions.  There were hardly any ripples in the surface of the river.  It was just me, the river, my kayak, and the noise of my paddle dipping into the water.

It is hard to appreciate how much background noise and clutter you work around until you can enjoy a place like the White Oak.

I like to think that when I come in from kayaking that my brain has cleared. This morning I had the benefit of a nice bike ride and some swimming before I even got in my kayak.

I have been struggling a little at keeping up on my blogs.  I only managed one post in the last week which puts me several posts behind.  Now I feel like the river has freed my mind, and I can get back to writing.

There were many days in Reston when I could have used a trip to White Oak.  That turns out to be a long trip from Reston.  Maybe given the high cost of fuel, the best way to visit would be through my latest YouTube video.

It that doesn't help try some of the pictures on my CoastalNC.org website.