Buxton, North Carolina

Buxton sits at Cape Hatteras itself, where the island juts furthest into the Atlantic and the coastline bends sharply south — the point where the warm Gulf Stream and cold Labrador Current collide to form Diamond Shoals, a fourteen-mile chain of shifting sandbars that has wrecked so many ships it's known as the "Graveyard of the Atlantic."

Cape Hatteras Lighthouse

Buxton's landmark is the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, the tallest brick lighthouse in the United States at 208 feet, built in 1870 to replace an earlier 1802 tower damaged during the Civil War. Rising sea levels and erosion threatened the structure by the 1930s, and in a widely covered 1999 engineering feat, the National Park Service moved the entire 4,800-ton lighthouse a half-mile inland on steel rails to save it from the advancing ocean. Visitors can climb its 257 steps seasonally for sweeping views over the cape.

World-Class Surfing at the Point

The same shoals that make Cape Hatteras dangerous for ships create some of the best and most consistent surf breaks on the East Coast, particularly the area known as "the Point," which draws surfers from up and down the coast, especially during hurricane swell season in late summer and fall.

A Base for the Cape

Buxton has grown into the commercial center of southern Hatteras Island, with surf shops, restaurants, and lodging clustered around the lighthouse and the entrance to Cape Point, a popular surf-fishing and four-wheel-drive beach area within Cape Hatteras National Seashore.