The Cape Henry Lighthouse is located in Fort Story which is an Army Base. After an inspection of the car we went onto the base to visit the Memorial Park.
Cape Henry was named in 1607 for one of the sons of King James the First of England. This area is where the first settlers landed in the America's. Cape Henry is the first lighthouse to be built in the United States and was finished in 1792. It's stands as a sentinel at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. It was in use for nearly a century before a metal lighthouse was built in it's place. It is the oldest surviving lighthouse in the USA.
There is a small park that commemorates the landing and provided an overlook onto the beach area where we saw dolphins frolicking in the water. We also saw Ruby-throated hummingbirds taking nectar from the Trumpet vine flowers.
We've were to the Currituck Lighthouse so this afternoon we stopped at both the Bodie Island Lighthouse and the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. Both of these are on the island itself and to get to the remaining 2 lighthouses you need to take ferries to get to them. The Bodie Lighthouse is just below Nags Head and was built in 1872. It followed 2 prior lighthouses near the same area - one of which that collapsed and another that was blown up as the Civil War started so the Union soldiers would not occupy it. On the grounds of the Bodie Lighthouse were several large areas of standing water from the recent rains that NC has been experiencing. In these areas were shorebirds feeding ~ Greater/Lessor Yellowlegs, Killdeer, Least Sandpipers, Semipalmated Sandpipers were among them. We also walked out to an observation tower that overlooked the creeks and salt marshes. When we looked down you could see the crabs in the water -very cool.
