DATE: Sunday, May 25, 1997                  TAG: 9705230318

SECTION: CAROLINA COAST          PAGE: 06   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: COVER STORY 

SOURCE: BY STEVE STONE, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:  322 lines

GUIDING LIGHTS TOURING TOWERS IS A GREAT WAY TO SHED LIGHT ON THE OUTER BANKS HISTORY.

WHEN THEY LAID the last bricks and first set the beacons ablaze, the builders of North Carolina's lighthouses intended for their towers to aid mariners. Today, technology has largely stolen those duties - but not the lighthouses' mission.

They are guides still, now as much for tourists and history buffs as for sailors and fishermen. And as such, they can be the purpose or the excuse to forgo the beach for a day or so.

``I didn't want to go,'' Kyle Martinez, 16, said as he wandered the grounds of the Currituck Beach Lighthouse in Corolla recently. ``We're only here four days. I want to be on the beach. But my mom wanted to do this. Now I'm glad we did. It was cool up there,'' he said, glancing back to the high perch atop the lighthouse. ``It's like you can almost see forever.''

There are four lighthouses - two open to visitors and two others can be viewed up close although not climbed - along the Outer Banks. Travelers can make it to all four in a day - and not really visit any. Instead, it is best to make a more leisurely effort of it. Use the lighthouses as an anchor for a driving tour you can modify at your whim. And be sure to bring a camera.

Assuming a starting point in the Nags Head or Kill Devil Hills area, head north on the first day to the Currituck Beach light in Corolla.

The drive alone will be fun, affording a chance to see how some get to spend their time at the beach. North of Duck, you'll find homes that do justice to the word palatial. Some are valued at $4 million or more.

Beautiful two- and three-story homes, most with so many windows the sun must seem more like a house guest than a celestial visitor, will steal your eyes from the highway. So be careful if you are doing the driving. And it is a winding, two-lane road with a maximum speed of 45 mph that is well enforced.

The red brick currituck light will come up on the west side of the road and has a small parking area adjacent to it.

Those who have followed the history of the effort to save this light and its related structures will marvel at just how well that task has gone. Well manicured lawns and gardens, well-maintained and freshly painted buildings, greet the visitor. Its a far cry from what this place looked like just a decade ago.

Most lighthouses have at least one adjacent building, some more than one. Usually, it is the keepers' quarters where once lived the men responsible for tending the lights' needs, especially in the days of fuel and flame. The keepers' families usually lived with there, too, and since one person couldn't do the job all the time, the quarters are almost always the early-American version of a duplex.

With the advent of electricity, the days of the keepers were numbered. And as stately and old-worldly as the lighthouses remain today, at their hearts now, usually, are computer brains. The keepers, alas, are part of lore, now. And their homes often were forgotten as their role vanished.

Currituck's Queen Anne-style keepers' house had fallen into disrepair, almost to the point of loss as its roof wasted away and decay took its toll. In the 1980s, Outer Banks Conservationists Inc. leased the site from the state and launched an ambitious restoration effort that continues today and has even included returning a building to the site that had been moved into the town.

These days, even the role of the lighthouses themselves have diminished. Satellites and global positioning systems, computerized charting and navigation systems, have taken on most of the responsibilities the beacons once bore. Yet, you'd be hard-pressed to find a seaman without an affinity for the towers, and a loyalty to them.

Loving lighthouses is a passion many

coastal residents have adopted, an allure most visitors find hard to resist.

Currituck is a good light to climb, given that its winding steps afford wide platforms at which to pause. The first window is 20 feet above ground, at a point where the brick walls are 5 feet 4 inches thick. The third window is 63 feet up and the walls there are 4 feet 6 inches thick. At the fifth window, you are 99 feet up facing a wall 3 feet 5 inches thick.

The steps themselves are impressive. Fashioned of iron with every piece clearly functional in nature, the finished product is beautiful for its lines.

One advantage of this lighthouse is that even for those fearful of taking the last few steps to the top, four windows at the upper-most level afford a dramatic view - without going outside. If your fear is not of heights, but edges, and you have a certainty that you will be the one for whom the railing fails, again take heart: There is ample room here to keep your back to a wall and still enjoy the view and the gusts of a seemingly perpetual gale.

Listen carefully while aloft and you may hear one of Corolla's wild horses neighing in the woods below. And, if you're lucky, you might even spot one wandering about after escaping from a refuge north of the road's end. And crane your neck a bit and check out the light itself, or, rather, the lens.

Looking to the southwest, you'll see the grounds of the Whalehead Club, a 35-room mansion railroad tycoon Edward Knight built in 1925 because his pistol-packing wife was not allowed in other all-male hunting clubs. Today, its a museum. Tours of the yet-to-be-restored waterfront wonder are offered daily.

Your trip north will likely consume no more than a half day. Corolla is about an hour's drive north of Nags Head, even in traffic. There are plenty of places to shop, eat and sightsee nearby.

Start the second day of lighthouse looking early - and head south toward Hatteras. The landscape changes dramatically as you wind past Whalebone Junction, onto federally preserved property. Shopping centers, traffic lights and beach homes become replaced by islands of trees dotting a landscape of marshland and rolling sand dunes. You're in the Cape Hatteras National Seashore, which stretches for 70 miles to Ocracoke Inlet and includes three lighthouses, as well as several villages.

Keep your eyes open as you head toward a radio tower. Just to the left, at the top of the tree line, you can catch your first glimpse of the Bodie (pronounced ``body'') Island Light. It will soon slip from a sliver on the horizon to the most dominant feature of the landscape. Then it will seem to vanish. That's when you'll know you're there.

Watch for the turn off for the Bodie Island Visitors Center and steer through the stand of trees that stole your view of the lighthouse.

Stepping out of the car, your ears will be assaulted by silence. Except for an occasional sea gull, you can't see or hear any sign of the ocean. Bodie Island light seems somewhat out of place so far inland.

Bodie light has a no-nonsense, working stiff look about it: Two black and three white stripes, complete with some smudges. It is the third lighthouse serving the area, others having been built in 1848 and 1859. Bodie was built on a 15-acre tract, purchased for $150, in 1871. Built at a cost of $140,000, it was first lit a year later. Initially, like most older lighthouses, it relied on whale oil and kerosene for fuel to power the beacon. In 1932, it was electrified and now uses a single 1,000-watt bulb to cast its beacon up to 19 miles.

So what happens when the bulb blows? No problem. The automated tower is equipped with a rotating system that moves a new light into place immediately.

The bulbs are surprisingly small, not much larger or longer than a telephone receiver. So how does that single bulb produce such a powerful light? Lenses. A piece of one is on display in the lighthouse museum in the keepers' house, giving an idea of how huge a complete lens system is.

A brick walk leads from the keepers' house to the base of the light. Kids will have fun walking straight at the tower and staring up at it as they do. The effect is an optical illusion that makes it appear that the tower is falling away as you get closer.

And check out the shadow of the tower itself. Like a giant sundial, the motion of el Sol is detectable as the lighthouse's shadow slowly works across small wildflowers dotting the grass.

The lighthouse itself is closed. And the area at its base is also roped off for safety reasons. But your stop here is not over for that shortcoming. Stroll across the grass, heading toward the back of the lighthouse.

The Bodie Island Pond Trail affords a walking tour of the marsh. And don't be deterred by the notation that it's a ``180-meter walk.'' While there is a 2-mile trail, you can cover the boardwalk in a matter of moments. Many species of wildfowl - egrets, heron and ducks among them - inhabit or visit the area, often flying within close range. Placards along the path explain marshlands, wildlife and consequences of over-development.

After visiting with nature, return to the keepers' quarters and visit the lighthouse gift shop. There are rest rooms on site. And there are plenty of places to have a picnic.

Back on the highway heading south, you'll soon cross over the Bonner Bridge. Here, dredges often are at work beneath the span, struggling to slow the steady movement of sand that threatens to fill Oregon Inlet. The bridge actually seems to span more beach than water.

South of the bridge, the Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge, covering 6,000 acres of barrier island and almost 28,000 acres of marshland and tidal creeks, includes boardwalks and paths. The villages of Rodanthe, Waves and Salvo are next. So this might be a good spot to stop for lunch. But keep an eye on your watch. If you want to climb Cape Hatteras light, you'll have to get there by 4 p.m.

Heading south from Salvo, you'll swing through Avon - and get your first glimpse of the nation's tallest brick beacon. The black and white, candy cane striping rises above the horizon. It seems to grow taller and more majestic as you approach Buxton - its beach front home.

Unlike Bodie light where there is no apparent sign of the ocean that is a lighthouse's charge, Hatteras Light is practically in its element. And that's part of the problem. The tower sits so close to the sea that some say the next storm could topple it. Historians and preservationists are launching an ambitious campaign to pick it up whole and move it inland to safety. They want to slide it away from the pounding surf it has steered untold sailors from for more than a century.

The climb to the top of this tower is free - but not for the faint of heart. Take your time. As the signs say, hiking to the top is like charging up the stairwell of a 20-story building. Leg muscles may rebel well before the last of 268 steps. How many trips to the gym and renewed diets has this trek brought? There are plateaus on which to pause and rest - and ample excuses to do so without admitting weariness: Nice brick work. Hey, see how you can look up/down the center? Hear how other peoples' footsteps and voices echo?

The reward of ascent - besides a pounding heart and a dry throat - is for the eye. The only other way to get this view is to take an aerial tour of the Outer Banks. And, on those, you don't have the option of stepping back to snap a perfect picture.

From here you'll finally understand the true fragility of a barrier island as ocean and sound sandwich the narrow stretch of land extending north and southwest from the light.

The ocean below is remarkable for its clearly bounded and distinguishable colors. Deep blue is dominant, stretching to the horizon. But, nearer shore, it turns greenish-blue and then green as depth diminishes and sand and silt mix in as waves stir up sediment.

``Look at how many different colors there are,'' said Kathi McAteer, 54, of Kent, Ohio.

The winds here are full of force, even on a day that seems calm below. Surfers roller-coaster on the waves below, minimalized to insignificance as one takes in the immensity of the sea they ride.

``It's impressive,'' said Kathi's husband, Bill McAteer, still catching his breath from the climb. ``It was a challenge. I checked all the windows, just to make sure they were clean.''

His son Kelly, 22, a student at Virginia Tech, just smiled and looked no worse for the climb.

Immediately below the beacon is evidence of nature's unrelenting progress at eroding the beach - and the near futility of man's efforts to delay that change. A jetty extends out into the sea, a full beach to one side. But a small sliver of sand is all that's left on the opposite end.

That side is where surf now pounds dangerously close to the lighthouse base, which is surrounded by rocks and huge sand bags put there as a final line of defense.

Imagine this same spot in full gale, or with a hurricane bearing down, and it becomes easy to understand why this light, perhaps the textbook example of a lighthouse, is said to guard the ``Graveyard of the Atlantic.''

Most of those vessels and crews so interred in the depths are victims of either weather or war. German submarines claimed many vessels during World Wars I and II. In the second world war, the coastal lighthouses were darkened, further heightening the dangers of the depths.

It is here, where the Gulf Stream meets the Labrador Current, that the resulting and sometimes unpredictable swirl of currents have claimed so many vessels.

And, scientists warn, unless the $8 million needed to lift and move the lighthouse (with another $4 million for its neighboring structures) is soon spent, that same raging ocean may soon claim the lighthouse itself. It stood a quarter-mile from the ocean when it was built. But now a sandy buffer only 120 feet wide separates it from the surf.

Plans are to excavate around its base, insert steel beams to create a platform, lift the 3,000-ton structure and then use twin tracks to move it a half-mile inland. It's not unlike moving the space shuttle from NASA's vehicle assembly building at Cape Canaveral, Fla., to the launch pad.

When or if the move will happen is uncertain, however. The National Park Service has yet to request the funds, even though it has spent more than $3 million just planting sea grass to slow beach erosion. Some people oppose the plan, saying the tower should stand its ground. But others don't want to lose it. The earliest the Cape Hatteras Light could be moved would be the turn of the century.

At the base of the beacon, there is a restored keepers' house where you'll find another gift shop and museum - this one with a large piece of a Fresnal lens and some interesting history about the U.S. Life Saving Service.

If it's still early enough in the day, and you don't mind adding another hour of driving each way, head southwest to the village of Hatteras and get ready to set sail. Your drive to the Ocracoke Island Lighthouse will include a 40-minute ferry ride, in itself reason enough to make the trip. Don't fret about the wallet suffering from the cost of transporting a car load of kin. The ferry crossing is free.

Back on solid ground, you'll soon steer south into Ocracoke Village. You may want to just drive around a bit to take in the sights in this working fishing village. Better still, park and rent a bike or just walk. Kids can tinker with fantasies of joining Blackbeard the Pirate who met his fate off Ocracoke in 1718.

The lighthouse, solid white, is the oldest of North Carolina's operating beacons. Note how its black balcony looks a little askew - not quite in the tower's center. This is a short, squat lighthouse that sits inland like Bodie Island Light.

Ocracoke's first lighthouse was built in 1803. But lightening destroyed it 15 years later. A new light, the one that still stands, was completed in 1823. Its lens was destroyed during the War of Southern Independence (Yanks call it the Civil War). But a new one was installed in 1864.

The tower is closed now. But you can look up to the lighthouse's lens. And there's a graveyard behind it that affords some interesting tombstone reading.

Some of the people interred there, no doubt, were victims of the sea. But no one knows how many countless other lives the four steady, stalwart sentinels of the Outer Banks have saved with their bright beacons.

Electricity may have replaced whale oil as their power source. Computers may have taken over the keepers' duties.

But the lighthouses that once steered sailors away from North Carolina's dangerous shores now draw thousands to climb their steep stairs - and marvel at their majesty. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photos by DREW C. WILSON

The Currituck Beach Lighthouse and the Whalehead Club at Corolla

that was built by railroad tycoon Edward Knight.

The Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, one of the most recognized landmarks

in the nation, was built in 1870 and first lighted in 1871. At 208

feet, it is the country's tallest brick beacon. Its rotating light

can be seen from 20 miles away. But keep an eye on your watch. If

you want to climb it, you'll have to get there by 4 p.m.

Graphic

ABOUT THE LIGHTS

Currituck Beach, Corolla

Built: 1873-1875

Height: 158 feet (214 steps)

First lighted: December 1875

Visibility: 18 miles

Sequence: 3 seconds on, 17 seconds off

Pattern: Red brick

Season: Open daily for tours 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Fee: $4 (no charge, 5 and under)

Phone: (919) 453-4939

Bodie Island Lighthouse

Built: 1871-1872

Height: 156 feet

First lighted: Oct. 1, 1872

Visibility: 19 miles

Sequence: 2.5 seconds on, 2.5 seconds off, 2.5 seconds on, 22.5

seconds off.

Pattern: horizontal black and white bands, each 22-feet high

Season: Open daily (tower closed), May through September

Fee: None

Phone: (919) 441-5711

Cape Hatteras Lighthouse

Built: 1870

Height: 208 feet (268 steps - nation's tallest brick beacon)

First lighted: 1871

Visibility: 20 miles

Sequence: Rotating every 7.5 seconds (light visible in any

direction, 1.5 seconds)

Pattern: black and white spiral

Paint: 165 gallons of black to recoat its stripes

Season: Open daily for tours, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Visitor center

open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Fee: None (donations requested)

Phone: (919) 995-4474

Ocracoke Lighthouse

Built: 1823 (2nd oldest in U.S.)

Height: 75 feet

First lighted: 1823

Visibility: 14 miles

Sequence: Steady white light

Pattern: Solid white tower with black trim on top

Season: Lighthouse closed. Visitor center next to the Swan

Quarter Ferry Terminal is open March through November, 9 a.m. to 5

p.m.

Fee: None

Phone: (919) 928-4531

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