Northampton County is one of two counties separated from the rest of Virginia, sitting on the southern tip of the Delmarva Peninsula; the only way to get there from Virginia without getting wet is to drive the Chesapeake Bay Bridge over and under 17 miles of Chesapeake Bay water. The bridge connects the city of Virginia Beach north to Northampton County, and the two areas couldn't be any more different: Virginia Beach is a major city with all sorts of big buildings, a snarl of streets and freeways, and traffic. Northampton County is a bucolic spread of sleepy homes, large properties, trees and sandy beaches. The highpont was the ostensible reason for coming up this way, but the real reason was for an excuse to drive the bridge itself.

We left Williamsburg and drove the 50-ish miles through Newport News, Hampton and Virginia Beach, following Interstate-64 and eventually getting onto US-13. Along the way we got caught up in traffic on a Hampton street, while a bike race was going on... they wouldn't let us pass and we had to wait forever. Other than that we made good time on this Sunday morning. We soon found ourselves at the pay kiosk for the Chesapeake Bay Bridge - for us, it was $19 round trip. We paid and started out onto the water. For the first three miles or so the bridge is built on cement piles about 20 feet above the water, then it comes to a man-made island composed of massive blocks of rock just piled together, on which a parking area, visitor center and maintenance warehouse sat. There was also a walking pier at this island, and we walked it, visiting the dozens of fisherpeople out hoping for some catch. We also spent time in the visitor center, but mainly just marveled at the overall construction. The large rocks are called 'rip-rap', by the way. From here the road descends into a tunnel, burrowing underneath the bay for about a mile before re-emerging up the way, still out over the water. The road stays above water for a bit, then descends underneath again then comes up above water before coming up over land on the south end of Northampton County. The underneath parts were interesting, and are there, obviously, so that the large ships can make their way into the bay.

Once on the other side of the bay we went north about 4 miles on US-13 then followed some local roads to a road called Butlers Bluff Road to a point where it turned from west to south, fronting a lengthy sandy bluff and the waters just beyond. The homes here are very nice. We parked across from house #3061 and walked up an old sandy track about 30 feet to top out on the sandy 'hilltop'. Although basically just a big dune, it is covered in trees, scrub and some spotty grass and is pretty solid and in place. We found the highest point without too much difficulty; our whole time here was maybe 10 minutes. Views into the bay were occluded by trees, but we looked north, west and south to be sure we hadn't missed anything. We were sure we hit the correct highest point. For a county where most elevations are lucky to break 10 feet, a 70-foot high bluff actually had quite a bit of prominence. Not too shabby, and a rather enjoyable little highpoint.

Once satisfied, we retraced our route and drove back across the Bay Bridge, eventually working our way toward Hampton and Newport News.