THE HOOK 



Yeomans' home is a haven to friends and family who want to enjoy the quiet and beauty of the cape. 



Core Sound Waterfowl Museum. "But 

 there's not a sign, not a marker, not a 

 trail, not a nothin' to tell about the 

 Hancocks and the Willises and the 

 Guthries of the banks." 



. et few could deny that the 

 National Park Service has faced a 

 Sisyphean chore on these embattled 

 islands. By nearly all accounts, parts of 

 Core Banks were literal dumps when the 

 national seashore was established. The 

 Park Service hauled away more than 



2,500 abandoned cars, trucks and bread 

 wagons jerry-rigged for surf-fishing. 

 Sandy four-wheel-drive roads had 

 churned across fragile vegetation and 

 carved gaps in the protective dunes that 

 allowed storm tides to wash across the 

 island. More than 340 structures, many 

 merely tar-paper shacks, were removed 

 by their owners or destroyed by the Park 

 Service. 



Now, as the rest of the Outer Banks 

 is transformed into a homogenous strip 

 of shopping centers, restaurants and 

 resorts, Cape Lookout bears the burden 

 of being many things to many people. It 

 is a wilderness preserve, fishing 



destination, campground, historic 

 district and nursery for terns and sea 

 turtles. And though lack of road access 

 keeps visitation far below that of Cape 

 Hatteras, its sequestered setting makes it 

 even more attractive to those who visit. 



More visitors create greater 

 demands, and just as Park Service 

 managers get a handle on balancing 

 fishers and turtles and plovers and beach 

 buggies and shell-seekers, new user 

 groups crop up with new concerns and 

 needs. The banks' sheltered waters and 

 sprawling marshes attract squadrons of 

 sea kayakers out for a half-day or a 

 week of base-camping in the dunes. And 



12 SPRING I99H 



