Five minutes in Rodanthe

Above: The back of the house in the movie Nights in Rodanthe, which is actually on the beach in Rodanthe, a town on Hatteras Island in the Outer Banks. Upper right: A Richard Gere sighting in Hatteras, in the Outer Banks. Right: The Tranquil Inn on the Waterfront in Manteo where Richard Gere stayed while filming the movie Nights in Rodanthe. Photo by Mimi Maddock While Carey Anne Blankenship and I were visiting our friend Nancy Reid Gilreath in Manteo in the Outer Banks, we rode by the house used in the film Nights in Rodanthe on our way to the island of Ocracoke. This road on Hatteras Island was in the movie. As we returned from a choppy ride on the ferry from Ocracoke, a tropical storm was brewing, and the road was covered with sand and foam swirling in from the dunes exactly like in the movie when the storm was approaching.

Rodanthe is a sign and a blink of the eye. The movie has definitely put it on the map. The only commercial establishment I saw on the road was "an open air market" where we got drinks and crackers. It was open in the front and all the way through to the back. All over the Outer Banks are Brew Thrus, places you can drive through for drinks, (alcoholic and non). However, there was no driveway in the back of this one, only 25 cats wandering around. The people were laid back and very friendly.

Manteo is on Roanoke Island in the Outer Banks. Andy Griffith owns many acres there, and Richard Gere stayed there during the filming of the movie.

The wild horses in the movie will probably not be found in Rodanthe. In the local newspaper, the people said not only did the horses surprise Diane Lane in the movie, but they would certainly shock the folks in town if they ever saw them.

Horses still roam free in parts of the Outer Banks. Descended from Spanish stock which arrived over 400 years ago, these horses have lived on the Outer Banks since the earliest explorers and shipwrecks.

In previous centuries there were thousands of horses roaming the full length of the Outer Banks from Shackleford Banks, all along Core Banks, Ocracoke, Hatteras, and on northward beyond Corolla on Currituck Banks.

An explosion of population and traffic eventually forced the wild horses north for their own safety into a protected area away from highways and speeding cars.

Just north of Corolla, where Hwy. 12 ends in a 4WD ramp onto the beach, there is a fence that stretches from the ocean to the sound. We drove to that area; however, once we reached it we could go no further. Its purpose is to keep the horses from wandering south onto the roads where they, like wayward deer, could be hit by cars. Only 4WD vehicles can make it up the beach past wildlife reserves to reach the communities of homes that have spread northward to the Virginia state line.

It is here, around Swan Beach at Penny's Hill, and North Swan Beach, and Carova that these wild horses continue to run free. The herd is now being managed with a plan to limit their number to about 60 horses.

After our ferry reached Ocracoke, we saw several of the ponies as we drove down the road to the town. About two dozen "banker ponies," as they are called on Ocracoke, are maintained and watched over by the National Park Service.

Photo by Carey Anne Blankenship Mimi Maddock braves the winds on the beach at Nags Head September 24, 2008, the afternoon before the tropical storm hit the Outer Banks. I picked up a copy of

The Island Breeze newspaper at the "open market." The following is taken from The September 2008 Vol. 18. No 9 article by Jenny Scarborough:

"Gere perhaps knows best that reality differs from the movies. Ferry workers report that only he, of all the cast and the crew, was pooped on by seagulls at least twice. Being spattered by seagull waste supposedly brings luck. Could this mean

Nights in Rodanthe is the

next Officer and a Gentleman

or Pretty Woman. Could it mean freedom for Tibet?"

Photo by Mimi Maddock Nancy Reid Gilreath recently moved to Manteo on Roanoke Island in the Outer Banks. She and her friend Carey Anne Blankenship are standing on a pier on the Waterfront, a block from The Tranquil Inn where Richard Gere stayed while filming Nights in Rodanthe. Photo by Mimi Maddock Andy Griffith owns a lot of property on the Outer Banks. It has been reported that he attends this church in Manteo.