Save the Date and Join Us for the 50th Anniversary Celebration of Jockey’s Ridge State Park

June 5, 6, 7, 8 2025

Join Us For a Four Day Celebration Including Live Entertainment, Educational and Recreational Programs, Tournaments, Homecoming Events, Sunset Toast, and much more! Free Programs for all to enjoy! A full itinerary and further details will be announced soon! Follow Friends of Jockey’s Ridge Facebook page for announcements.

BIG ANNOUNCEMENTS COMING SOON! STAY TUNED! Make your plans now to celebrate with us!

Interested in partnering with us and adding your organization to our list of fantastic sponsors? Contact info@friendsofjockeysridge.org for more information!

Suggested Email for Comments Period Ending Nov 4^th

Email: DCMcomments@deq.nc.gov

Subject Line: Jockey’s Ridge

To: NC Division of Coastal Management

I support the proposed CRC rule (15A NCAC 07H .0508) to re-designate Jockey’s Ridge as an Area of Environmental Concern (AEC) and to protect Jockey’s Ridge from development and loss of sand.

Support Jockey’s Ridge! Please attend this upcoming hearing on Tuesday, October 15th at 1pm at the Visitors Center and send in your public comments to the NC Division of Coastal Management at DCMcomments@deq.nc.gov by November 4, 2024.

Review previous Friends of Jockey’s Ridge public comments on the AEC.

11a.m. Friends of Jockey’s Ridge Open Board Meeting & Membership Event with the Dueling Dinosaurs & Tubbs Hot Dogs & Snow Cones

12:30 Sandcastle Contest Registration (see attached rules – all are invited!)

1:00 Sandcastle Contest; or

1:00 Dune Hike with Jockey’s Ridge Park Ranger

Sandcastle Contest at Jockey’s Ridge State Park

Rules, Registration, & Tips

Date/Time: September 14th Registration 12:30pm Contest 1:00-2:00pm Judging/Awards 2:00pm

Registration: In-person registration will take place on Dune Days at 12:30pm at the end of the boardwalk at Jockey’s Ridge State Park; or register in advance by sending an email with your name and team members names (if applicable) to info@friendsofjockeysridge.org. No fee to participate. You can register as an individual or as a team. Come early and enjoy a Tubbs hot dog lunch and snow cone!

Prizes:

1^st Place – Jockey’s Ridge t-shirts for each team member, 1 Jockey’s Ridge Christmas ornament, 1 Save our Sand Dunes Book and your creation posted on Friends of Jockey’s Ridge social media

2^nd Place – 1 Jockey’s Ridge t-shirt, 1 Christmas ornament and your creation posted on Friends of Jockey’s Ridge social media

3^rd Place – 1 Jockey’s Ridge t-shirt and your creation posted on Friends of Jockey’s Ridge social media

Rules:

This contest is for everyone! This is a family-friendly, kid-friendly, adult-friendly event and you do not need to be an expert! You will receive a flag marker with a number to represent your location for sculpting your masterpiece when you arrive and register. The contest will take place at the end of the boardwalk at Jockey’s Ridge State Park near the dunes.

Please bring your own equipment (buckets, shovels, etc), no artificial decorations allowed, no power tools allowed – hand tools only, water sprayers allowed, no additives of any kind can be used (flour, glue, etc), items to form shapes such as buckets, pots can be used to build your sculpture but should be removed prior to judging. No Theme! While we are using the word sandcastle contest, you are not required to build a castle, you can create anything of your choice! You get to pick your theme!

We will provide a location for you to have access to water to assist with sculpting. Have a bucket available to collect the water and bring back to your station. Plan ahead and lets’ have some sandcastle fun! We can’t wait to see your creations!

In response to the October 15, 2024 public hearing held at Jockey’s Ridge State Park, the Friends of Jockey’s Ridge Chairman of the Board, Craig Honeycutt, submitted comments in support of the proposed Coastal Resources Commission rule to re-designate Jockey’s Ridge as an Area of Environmental Concern (AEC).

On April 25, 2024, we attended the NC Coastal Resources Commission with these comments: Friends of Jockey’s Ridge letter to the CRC 4/25/24

On April 4, 2024, ahead of the April 8th meeting of the Rules Review Commission, Friends of Jockey’s Ridge submitted comments to the Rules Review Commission again expressing strong support for the temporary rules adopted by the Coastal Resources Commission, including the AEC designation.

On January 22, 2024, Friends of Jockey’s Ridge submitted comments to the Coastal Resource Commission urging the commissioners to readopt the AEC status for Jockey’s Ridge.

To learn more about the Area of Environmental Concern and the recent process to remove this status from Jockey’s Ridge, please visit the Coastal Review Article.

Review 15A NCAC 07H .0507 designating Jockey’s Ridge a unique coastal geologic formation.

Be sure to stop by the Friends of Jockey’s Ridge table for a craft project for the kids!

Join Jockey’s Ridge State Park, Friends of Jockey’s Ridge, and other local partners in celebrating all those in the community that helped preserve and continue to help preserve and protect this wonderful natural resource. It has been 50 years since the day the bulldozer was stopped at the back of the ridge by Carolista Baum! We will also be celebrating her birthday.

Dune Day will include live music with Mojo Collins & Craig Honeycutt! Enjoy hotdogs, shaved ice, a beer tent (bring ID!) and a sunset walk up Jockey’s Ridge at 7 pm. Many thanks to Outer Banks Brewing Station and Tortugas (Boardwalk Sponsor) for keg donations!

This free, family-friendly event is at Jockey’s Ridge State Park Visitor Center, 300 W Carolista Dr, Nags Head, NC 27959 (Milepost 12; Highway 158).

Looking forward to seeing you Tues, August 15th from 4 – 7:30 pm… The Friends Board

Our ribbon cutting ceremony will take place on Thursday, May 25, 2023 at 1:00 PM. The secretary of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources will be speaking alongside our Interim Director of State Parks, the Chair of our friend’s group and the daughter of Carolista Baum. We sincerely hope everyone can join us in this celebration and get a look at the new center.

Other important things happening around the park include the installation of our Living Shoreline structure, construction of the Mountains to Sea terminus marker and preliminary work on the new boardwalk. The living shoreline is being upgraded using granite rock to reduce wave action along the shoreline. The Coastal Federation has been the lead in this project, and it is progressing nicely. The project should be complete by mid-late May so if you hear noise and see heavy equipment along the shoreline this is the cause. Be careful where you walk out there! Local school children will be helping re-establish the vegetation by planting native plants over the next few years.

Since this is the Year of the Trail in NC State Parks, we are excited to have a terminus marker being constructed for the Mountains to Sea Trail and a ribbon cutting ceremony is planned for this fall. It will be located at the end of the new boardwalk. Visitors can take their photo at the end of the Mountains to Sea Trail and have a wonderful keepsake to take home with them!

Design plans have been under way to replace the existing boardwalk and add an extension to enable visitors to make it all the way to the base of the dunes. The new boardwalk will be wider, more accessible and have a gazebo at the end. Construction will likely begin in the fall for the replacement of the existing boardwalk, and we anticipate the addition to be completed by next summer.

Finally, by the end of the month all our summer interns will be on board and ready to help make our first summer in the new visitor center a success. We anticipate park programming to be at the level of years past so please come check out all the wonderful activities we have planned! I hope to see many of you at the upcoming ribbon cutting and have a wonderful spring.

Sincerely,

Joy Greenwood

Superintendent, Jockey’s Ridge State Park

Calling all Photographers!

Submission deadline: March 24, 2023

Would you like to have your photo featured in the community room at Jockey’s Ridge State Park? Friends of Jockey’s Ridge is looking for submissions of photographic images of Jockey’s Ridge to exhibit in the new Visitor Center Community Room.

The Jockey’s Ridge Visitor Center has been undergoing renovations for over a year. The grand opening is currently scheduled for May 25, 2023. One of the features in the Visitor Center will be a Community Room with seating and artwork.

Vision: The plan is to use a combination of wide-angle landscape images and tightly cropped textures to make colorful groupings around the room. The images will be printed on a large format printer, then face-mounted to acrylic.

Timeline: Images need to be submitted for consideration by March 24th. Images will be selected in early April.

Technical Specs: Some of the prints will be quite large. Ideally, we would print them at 300 pixels per inch, but if the file quality is not available, we may be able to use them for smaller prints. The sizes planned are: 58” x 32”, 32’ x 28”, 15” x 27”, and 13” x 15”

Please use the link below for submissions (also includes permission for usage)

Call for Entries Form

The images will be chosen by an interpretive design team with the North Carolina State Parks.

For questions, please contact Friends of Jockey’s Ridge board member, Holly Nettles at hollynettles@gmail.com or contact Friends of Jockey’s Ridge at friendsofjockeysridge@gmail.com.

Photo: Ray Matthews