Thanks, I just looked it up. Looks like a place I wouldn’t want to be, in hurricane season.
1600 feet — in the Watauga valley —is a better altitude for me.
The weather is a definitely visible force of nature out there day to day. I love it, the wind, the roar of the surf, so primal. Not many beaches can match it, not in the east at least. Makes you feel free, but very small. The locals ride out minor hurricanes, drive their vehicles into their living rooms to get them off the ground. Major ones, very few remain. New inlets get cut in big storms, so the island can come out from under you.