THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, December 12, 1994 TAG: 9412120055
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY ANNE SAITA, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CAROVA LENGTH: Long : 104 lines
When Jessica Pool missed classes one day, the word around Knotts Island Elementary School was that the sixth-grader from Carova had gone overboard.
Actually, she was just ``feeling kinda low.'' But her friends' concern was understandable, since she and her younger brother, Kevin, get to and from school by boat.
For the past eight years, their father has navigated the sometimes dangerously shallow or frozen waters of the Currituck Sound twice a day to ensure that his children spend more time on their books, not the bus.
A round-trip on a school bus, including driving to and from the bus stop in Corolla, could last up to five hours, Charles Pool said. The boat trip lasts about 10 minutes.
``The objective is to educate them as best you can, not bore them to death riding a bus,'' he said.
Other families with school-age children in the more-remote reaches of Currituck's Outer Banks hold similar beliefs and have approached Pool about sending their sons and daughters to school on his 19-foot Southern Skimmer.
As the extreme north beaches continue to attract more residents - the total is now about 250 - Pool believes there will be increased demand for his services.
The Currituck County Board of Education must decide whether to give Pool a requested $17,556 to ship up to 10 children each day to Knotts Island during the school year.
The money would pay for oil and gas, time and labor, and depreciation on his vessel, which is equipped with radar, cellular phone, windshield wipers and a hard top. He bought the boat six months ago.
Without a boat, families in Carova must drive their children through sandy lanes or along the oceanfront during low tide to Corolla and wait for a bus to take them to various schools, usually in Dare County.
There are now 32 public school students within 1,762 Currituck Outer Banks homes. The county's pupil population is just under 3,000.
``What I'm doing is keeping them in the school system and not having them pay $1,500 per kid to Dare County,'' Pool said.
Pool, a general contractor who works in Virginia Beach, takes three children, and sometimes two more, from the canal behind his Carova home to the shores of Knotts Island's public docks a mile and a half away.
The Pools head out the door about 7:45 a.m., with Kevin Pool, 10, and his older sister responsible for casting off the lines.
During the typical 10-minute ride, girls sit on one side of the boat, boys on the other, usually chatting with each other.
Before the new boat, which cost Pool a little more than $20,000, the family motored to school in a flat-bottomed vessel with only a canvas top.
During cold spells, the children would sit backward to avoid icy spray smacking them in the face, their hands clamped around parka hoods to seal out the driving wind.
For Jessica and Kevin, those days are only a chilling memory. Not so for Rae and Jed Scanlon, two other Carova children who traverse the sound in an open boat.
``I hate it,'' Jed repeatedly said of the experience, despite warnings from his mother that he really didn't mean it. The smile on Jed's face seemed to indicate she was right. The Scanlons ride with the Pools once a week or so, depending on the weather.
Rare is it when Pool can't make his way to or from school because of weather. Only three times in two years has passenger Becky Halioua's mother had to drive Becky and the two Pool children to school when the frozen sound was impenetrable.
That doesn't mean, however, that it's always smooth sailing.
``Sometimes the wind will blow most of the water to the southern end of the sound,'' Pool said. ``Then you can almost ride a four-wheel-drive through it.''
The wind also used to pull Pool's former (keel-less) boat off course. And more than once, father and children were up to their knees in mud, trying in dense fog to free their grounded boat. Getting their bearings after going adrift used to take some work, too.
Even with the inconveniences, the Pool children wouldn't have it any other way.
``It's like being on an adventure,'' Jessica said. ``On real windy days you can run into the marsh, and that's pretty cool.
``And in the summer, if you're real hot and sweaty after school, you can ride up front. Instead of coming into an air-conditioned house, you're already cool.''
Next year promises to bring even more trips and an earlier schedule when Jessica graduates to J.P. Knapp Junior High School in Currituck.
Before taking the younger children to school by 8:30, Pool will have to get Jessica to the Knotts Island ferry two hours earlier. The 45-minute ferry ride will let her off a half-mile mile from the mainland school.
``We're going to get into the boat whether it's raining or freezing,'' Pool said. ``You all worry about the weather more than we do up here. The only difference is if the water's low, you might get stuck and have to push the boat.
``Then again, you might have to push your car out of the mud, too.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by DREW C. WILSON, Staff
Charles Pool, standing, uses a 19-foot motorboat to take his two
children and others across Currituck Sound to school on Knotts
Island - and then bring them home again. From left are Rae and Jed
Scanlon, who ride with Pool once a week or so, and Jessica and Kevin
Pool.
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by CNB