I found this image on the Webshots website, having seen it on a friend's machine.  It was taken by Michael Ryan, while he and his family were on vacation on the Outer Banks.

To download a compressed self-extracting .exe file that will extract the full-size .bmp file into your C:\Windows directory, click on the link below.

Ocracoke.exe  (610 kb)

If you're using Internet Explorer (and most of you will be), the easy way to do all this will be to select the "Run this program from its current location" option.  That way, you don't have to find the file once it's downloaded; IE will do that for you, and open the file automatically.

If you're using Netscape, you won't have this option, and so will need to download the file to some such location on your hard drive. After the file is downloaded, find it with Windows Explorer or My Computer, and double-click on it.  WinZip Self-Extractor will start; click on the Unzip button.
 
 

This will unzip the file "Ocracoke.bmp" into your C:\Windows folder.  NOTE:  if your Windows installation resides in another location on your computer, you'll have to type this into the "Unzip to folder" box.  The default is C:\Windows, but I have seen a few machines where the Windows installation resides in C:\Windows.000, or D:\Windows.

If you want, you can delete the "Ocracoke.exe" file you downloaded, once this unzip operation is complete.
 

Once the .bmp file is unzipped into your Windows folder, you'll be able to choose the Ocracoke wallpaper from within Display Properties.  Click on the Start button, then select Settings, Control Panel, Display.  Click on the Background tab, if it isn't in the forefront already.  Any .bmp file present in your Windows directory will show up in the Wallpaper list .  Click on "Ocracoke" and then click Apply, and OK.

If the image doesn't fill your screen correctly, set the 'Display' option in the lower right-hand corner to "Stretch".

There's a gray bar across the bottom of the wallpaper image; this should be covered up by your task bar.  The gray bar is a spacer, used so that the task bar will not cover up part of the picture.

Enjoy!