Trips to the Beach Built on the Shoulders of Paper Mache Dinosaurs and Ellis Island

There’s a thin stretch of beach off the coast of North Carolina that goes by many names. Sailors of the 19^th century called it the graveyard of the Atlantic (copyright David Stick 1952); wayward vacationers call it the Outer Banks; some call it the OBX because, goddamn, abbreviations and the letter ‘X’ are too hip to resist; and the rest call it Nags Head even though Nags Head is only one of the ten other towns on the strip. Regardless of what you call the place, I call it Nags Head, this hot vacation spot and I have a rocky relationship.

It’s a scientific fact that every living soul in the North Carolina tri-state area holds Nags Head in such high regard that outsiders may very well think it is the resting place for the lost ark, the Holy Grail and those glowing rocks that let the Indian guy rip out the dude’s heart. Shit, even I do it. For being so vocally against the place, I still find myself singing its praises to those less enlightened and I don’t know why I do it. I don’t like going to the beach, I don’t really like seafood, and I don’t fish but I’ve been to the place nine-million fucking times. It’s like repeatedly sleeping with a girl you don’t even like and not being able to stop yourself. It’s horrible. But, being the amateur social scientist that I am, I returned once again to analyze the place that I both adore and detest.

It’s obvious that the main draw for Nags Head is the water. It is an inarguable fact that humans are drawn to water, to the point that it’s not even worth discussing. But what makes this water so incredibly special? If there were some sort of beach beauty pageant, Nags Head would not only win the contest, it would also win Miss Congeniality, the swimsuit competition, and the viewers fucking choice award. The beaches aren’t combed, there’s no boardwalk, and there isn’t anyone waking you up to ask if you want your goddamn picture taken. See? It’s happening again. I sound like I’m on the Nags Head street team and I’m not even trying. But there is a growing seed of commercialization that threatens to kill the uncultivated charm of the place. For every old house that the sea destroys every Hurricane season another bright yellow Sunsation building is built in its wake right next to an Applebee’s.

The place has some odd quirks as well, and I think this is what I enjoy most about it. Like every other beach community, there are several hundred mini-golf courses but none quite as peculiar as the ones in Nags Head. There are your typical pirate and beach themed courses; I mean come on, those are too obvious to not exist. But where does a course that’s main feature is a gigantic neon green T-Rex poised on a volcano/waterfall that looks as if it is about to eat putters if they fuck up on their first stroke fit in? Or another that is so heavily “influenced” by Star Wars that the obstacles should have “copyright LucasArts” painted all over them to avoid lawsuits. Even the aforementioned “beachy” themed courses are closing in favor of just flat out weird shit, like a pirate one that turned into an epic cave exploration quest complete with 50 foot tram ride. I suppose any place that boldly features giant spaceships crashed into a volcano (Volcanoes are big in mini golf in general, I’ve noticed) gains points with anyone.

Another oddity which Nags Head boldly features is their secret immigrant work force. But these immigrants don’t even have the 21^st century flare of being Mexican. Nags Head apparently continues to kick it old school by pawning off the work nobody else wants to do to 15 to 20 year old Eastern European girls, just like the good old days. Most every item of food I was sold was given to me accompanied by an eerily deep voice coming from the emaciated frame of a 12 year old girl named Sonja. You just don’t see shit like this anywhere else. I didn’t even know how to react. Why a beach town in North Carolina? Why? Why would what seems like hundreds of girls from the former USSR want to work in Nags Fucking Head? But I suppose it’s better to the number one job for under aged Yugoslavian girls in America, which is, of course, amateur porn. Which leads me to wonder if Nags Head has a large underground amateur porn ring that I don’t know about. All the better if it did, I say.

Despite my constant insistence that I hate Nags Head, all I can do is talk about how awesome it is. I simply cannot stop. Please help me.