I did what you are contemplating about 3 years ago. Newport Beach to Oriental, NC. What a cultural shock!!

But we did it for a couple of reasons:

Oriental is a charming little town. Off the beaten path, no stop lights for 10 miles.

It is first and foremost a boating/cruising town. Active cruising clubs, conversation about boats at the Bean in the morning, several good boatyards.

It has several institutions that keep the town interesting: Towndock.net the local website, the Bean- the coffee shop, the Old Theater that puts on plays and music performances, the harborfront, the boatyards, .....

It has the cheapest ICW accessible water front property on the east coast.

Contrary to another poster's comment, there are dozens of places to drop the hook within a day's sail of Oriental.

The water isn't really brown, maybe it is up in the Dismal Swamp canal due to leaf tannin. But it isn't green either.

The creeks don't freeze (well at least not hard but this was a tough winter) and there aren't any noseeums (but lots of mosquitos).

What more can I say.

David