The Crystal Coast is an ideal family vacation area, full of beautiful, unspoiled beaches and things to do, minus the high-speed traffic hassles of overly commercialized areas. Take the kids on harbor tours, dinner cruises, sightseeing excursions out of Morehead City, Atlantic Beach and Beaufort.
Older kids can go deep sea or inland charter fishing.
Rent daysailers, canoes, kayaks, jetski's, windsurfers, skiffs and motorboats. First-timers can take sailing and windsurfing lessons in the protected waters of Bogue Sound. Explore Cape Lookout National Seashore and Shackleford Banks, both undeveloped, with excellent shelling and surf fishing. When the kids are waterlogged, examine the touch tanks and hands-on programs at the NC Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores or the NC Maritime Museum in Beaufort. Explore the Old Jail and grounds at the Beaufort Historic Site which also has narrated, English double-decker bus tours of town.