A Quick Trip to Chincoteague and Assateague Islands on the Coast of Virginia

What do you do when your little girl turns 11 and wants to see some horses? You leave your camper behind and head to the coast of Virginia to see some horses!

As a little backstory, years ago Emma was given the book series Misty of Chincoteague from her grandmother, which is all about a horse named Misty on the Island of Chincoteague. Only Emma had read the books. Since moving into our RV and finding ourselves with longer car rides, we have all been listening to the Audiobooks together. It’s been a great bonding experience as all four of us listen together and can pause it to discuss. We use Audible through Amazon which works seamlessly. Some Audiobooks are free on there, some you pay a monthly fee for and can pick so many a month. It’s been a great subscription for us. Get your own subscription here.

In the first few books of the series, we have learned about the Island of Chincoteague and the Bebe ranch, which is where the two main characters live along with Misty. We also learned about the nearby Island of Assateague, where all the wild horses live after originally getting there from a Spanish Galleon that crashed in the sea. Every year the wild horses are rounded up by cowboys and swam across the channel to Chincoteague where they can be bought – the funds going to the local fire department. It has been an exciting series to listen to, and knowing that we were going to visit there was even more incentive to keep listening.

We decided to leave our camper right at our spot in Glouchester where we’d been and instead get a cabin for a couple of days. We found a great deal at the Sun Outdoors in Chincoteague. We had about a 3.5-hour drive from point A to point B but it was a very neat ride. Since we were headed almost back up to the Maryland border, we had some tunnels and bridges to take.

While a ferry would have been ideal, this route was very scenic and included 3 tunnels that went underneath the water so boats could pass above. This is the Chesapeake Bay Tunnel/Bridge area. Probably not for the faint of heart or to be riding with a passenger that said “I wonder what you do if this starts to flood.”

The water appeared very choppy from the wind on our way out, making us thrilled that we had decided to leave the camper behind for this trip. On the return back, it was much less windy and a smoother ride.

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Pulling into the Sun Outdoors was like we had arrived at some tropical island. There were even palm trees!

It really was a beautiful spot right on the edge of the island. There were quite a few RV spots, as well as the little blue cabins/cottages we stayed in, and even a section of yurts, all looking out at the water. It was a marshy area leading out to the ocean. You could see fishermen on the piers and fishing boats passing by in the early morning hours and returning in the evening.

The best part of our cabin? The rooftop porch. It opened up so you could see out at the whole campground or out at the water. Check out our walk-through of the cabin here, with the end opening up to the roof. Wouldn’t you want to have your coffee there in the morning?

The one thing missing in the cabin that I thought would be there was an oven. There was a stove top, but no oven. That put a kibosh on the birthday girl’s plan of frozen pizza for dinner. A pizzeria it was! We found Ledo’s Pizza on the island. They had good service and good food. We weren’t disappointed!

First thing the next morning we had a boat ride booked. I booked it on Trip Advisor after seeing some different options in the area and seeing the timing available. Here is the one we went on.

We set sail at 9:30 am, and it was chilly! Luckily the sun was up and if you were on the correct side of the boat, you were in the sun. As soon as we set sail, there were birds flying about and dolphins jumping all around the cove. It was breathtaking and a great way to start the boat ride.

While the goal of the tour was to see some of the wild ponies along the shores, we didn’t get to see any. I’d say we were just as happy being able to see dolphins and all the shore birds.

Captain Shane was knowledgeable about the Island’s history and taught us many things we didn’t know prior. One is that there are many things in the area known as Tom’s Cove, for example. Yet, they don’t know who or where the name Tom came from. Another thing he informed us of was that next July marks the 100th pony swim. What a neat thing to be able to watch. We immediately went online to try to book the Sun Outdoors for that time, only to find it was completely booked already. This pony swim is a big thing!

Since we didn’t see any horses on the boat ride, we hopped on our Lectric Bikes took a ride around the island, and ventured onto Assateague Island, where they reside. This is a National Park so we were able to get our National Park Passport stamped. We talked to a Park Ranger there who also confirmed that it really is a mystery who Tom is.

This bike trip around the island was just beautiful. There were many trails throughout that were paved. It was all wooded with lookout points to see different wildlife, including a group of 12 horses that were grazing. While they are wild ponies, we did learn that the fence is there now to keep them more to one side of the island to protect the birds and other wildlife that reside there too.

In one of the water areas we got to watch this bird fishing for lunch. Really neat to stop and watch.

What was also very impressive was Assateague Beach at the end of the island. The views were simply breathtaking, at sunset and midday. The waves were incredible to watch and listen to. It was just an amazing, beautiful place.

On our nighttime walk on the beach, we came across this bush that had washed up at one point. Upon looking at it closer, you could see that visitors walking by had added shells to it, almost like decorations to a Christmas tree. We had to add some of our own of course! It pays to pay attention to your surroundings and stumble upon things like this.

By the time we had biked to Assateague and all around the island and returned to the cabin, it was 20 miles. Our bikes had only lost half of their charge – we could have done it twice!

We are definitely covering much more ground with these bikes than we would have on regular bikes. Very happy about the investment!

We finished the awesome island day off with a seafood dinner at Don’s Seafood on the island, which was a recommendation from the Captain. We had seafood chowder, middleneck steamers, and broiled scallops. It didn’t disappoint!

We had a great time exploring these islands, giving us a taste of island life. I’m sure this place is hopping in the summer but was nice and quiet now in October. There is a lot to see and do here, including the shops, museums and beaches. We were so glad we made the trip there and can’t wait to return again – maybe for the pony swim!