Oriental

Thursday, we enjoyed lunch in an Oriental restaurant.  That is, a restaurant we have visited many times in the past called The Silos, which is located in Oriental, NC.  Oriental is a pretty little Town on the Neuse River, which is billed as “North Carolina's Sailing Capital,” where they say “the boating season never ends.”  It is pretty quiet this time of year, although I have no doubt that boating does occur in every month of the year one way or another.  You can drive to Oriental in a roundabout way by going through New Bern, but the shorter and far more interesting way is to drive to the Cherry Branch Ferry Terminal and take the ferry to Minnesott Beach, on the other side of the broad Neuse Rivere, another kind of “boating.”

 
The ferry is operated by the N. C. Department of Transportation and there is no cost, which always surprises us.  Crossing the Neuse every half-hour by ferry is a normal commute for many, but for us it is always a treat.  While commuters sit in their cars, we normally stand outside (unless the cars are stacked bumper-to-bumper as they were on our return trip), watching sea gulls draft behind the ferry, suspended with motionless wings above us, or sometimes resting on a lifebuoy.

In 2019, we took a ferry from Holyhead to Dublin that dwarfed this tiny one.  Once the largest in the world, it crossed the Irish Sea, a distance of 70 miles, in three hours and 30 minutes.  It seemed more like a shopping mall than a ferry, with bars, restaurants, and shops.  It was so large that we were not even aware of any movement, unlike this little ferry across the Neuse, which on a rough day would have made us a little queasy.

The Silos, AKA “Oriental’s Favorite Joint,” was constructed within two grain silos, features mostly Italian food, and does not have an Asian item on the menu,  nor (surprisingly) any seafood, although there may be seafood specials during the season.

What we like best is the hand-tossed pizza, with a delicious marinara sauce made fresh daily.  And, of course, the unusual décor.  Climb upstairs and you enter a cozy little space with a ceiling  completely covered in record album covers, most of them from our own era and many of which I recognize as having owned at one time or another.

“This brings back memories!” I told the young waitress who took our order, first pulling two pints of very good local beer for us from Shortway Brewing in Newport.  “I think I owned most of them at one time or another.”  She laughed, and I realized that she was probably born at least two decades after most of this music was made.  There is a small stage and a lot of impressive amplifiers and accessories, and musical groups perform regularly during the season in keeping with its description as a “Joint.”

The pizza was delicious, as always, and after lunch we drove back to “downtown” Oriental to one of Martha’s favorite shops, Nautical Wheelers, before taking the ferry back.  There had been a mere three cars that morning, but by the afternoon, some 25 or so cars were lined up waiting to cross.  We thought some of them might have to wait for the next ferry, but they somehow managed to squeeze all of them aboard in four narrow aisles, bumper to bumper. 

This was a day of rest for both of us.  I had run four miles on Wednesday, including a set of four “Picnic Area Intervals,” and was planning to run six miles on Friday.  So it was nice to take a day off from training for the 5-K race coming up next weekend, enjoy some good pizza and beer, and let ourselves be ferried from one sunny shore to another.