Old Lighthouse Beach Access

Old Lighthouse Beach Access is the beach behind the beach everyone comes to Buxton for. It sits right off the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse grounds, where a boardwalk crosses the dune to a wide stretch of sand that's one of the busiest swimming beaches on Hatteras Island — helped along by a paved parking lot and a short, flat walk instead of a soft-sand slog.

Lifeguards and Lighthouse Views

This is one of the small handful of beaches within Cape Hatteras National Seashore with seasonal National Park Service lifeguards on duty during the summer months, which makes it a solid pick for families and less confident swimmers on a stretch of coast where rip currents are a real concern. The black-and-white spiral of the lighthouse — the tallest brick lighthouse in the country, moved inland in 1999 as the ocean closed in on its original site — rises just behind the dune line. The lighthouse itself is currently closed to climbing while the Park Service addresses a structural issue with its cast-iron support brackets, so plan on admiring it from the sand rather than from the top.

Getting There

The access sits just off NC-12 in Buxton, the single road connecting the Hatteras Island villages, so keep an eye on conditions during hurricane season (roughly August through October), when the highway can flood or close. Shoulder season — April, May, September, October — tends to bring calmer water and thinner crowds than the peak summer stretch.