Tybee Island, Georgia- Tybee Island Museum

Tybee Island is about a 30 minute drive from Savannah.  My grandpa really loves to visit Tybee Island, but for some reason it hadn’t made it on my list of destinations until just about the moment I decided to hit the highway.  I had had a bit of a homesick day (although it was a mix of homesickness for Missouri and for Asheville) and I decided that I needed to be in the car for a bit.  So, I gathered some food together for a picnic on the beach and then hit the road.

When I got to Tybee Island, I realized that it was still just as cold and there as it was in Savannah, so a picnic on the beach was not going to be the huge success I thought it was going to be (call me crazy, but I thought The South is supposed to be warm!).

I was disappointed that my time on this island wasn’t going to be the experience I was originally anticipating, but when I saw that they had a lighthouse and a history museum and I decided that that was how I was going to spend my day.

The Tybee Island Museum is located in Battery Garland, which was completed in 1899.  Inside the museum you can see artifacts from several time periods, different controlling powers and the way Tybee Island has changed to adapt to modern times.  I thought I would share some of my favorite parts of the exhibits:

There were tons of really amazing antique weapons.  The swords were definitely my favorites.

A diving suit from the 1940’s that weighed 149.5 pounds!  Holy cow, that’s 25 pounds more than I weigh!  How did they get back up?!

Pirate and Spanish artifacts

The museum was filled with a lot of information about the way Tybee Island was used throughout wars, for scientific research and a hot vacation spot.  Plus, a little over halfway through the museum you got to go up on top of the battery and get a pretty awesome view.

You can see other batteries in the background of this photo

The admission to the museum is part of a collection of stops including the lighthouse (which wasn’t open while I was there because they were repainting it), a home built in a style very typical to Tybee Island, a video and the light keeper’s home.  Keep a lookout for a post on the other stops very soon.

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