Altamaha Scenic Byway Driving Tour

Boardwalk and shrimp boats along the Darien waterfront on the Altamaha Scenic Byway

Photo: Jud McCranie, aka Bubba73, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The Altamaha Historic Scenic Byway follows GA 99 and U.S. 17 for 17 miles through McIntosh and Glynn counties and the city of Darien, from the Sapelo Island Visitor Center at Meridian to the historic Needwood Church and School. Along the way are Fort King George, the Butler Island and Hofwyl-Broadfield rice plantations, the Darien waterfront, sweeping salt marsh and live oaks draped in Spanish moss.

Length17 miles
RoadsGA 99, McIntosh Road, GA 25 Spur and U.S. 17
FromSapelo Island Visitor Center, Meridian
ToNeedwood Church and School

Coastal History Along the Way

The byway is a collage of coastal history: the Guale people and Spanish missionaries of the 1500s and 1600s, the British outpost at Fort King George, the Scottish Highlanders who founded Darien in 1736, and the rice and cotton planters who followed. Descendants of the enslaved Africans who built the 19th-century plantations still live in communities along the route, and the Gullah Geechee community of Hog Hammock endures on Sapelo Island.

Map of the Altamaha Historic Scenic Byway along GA 99 and U.S. 17 near Darien — The Altamaha Historic Scenic Byway, from Meridian through Darien.

Places to Visit

Sapelo Island Visitor Center

At Meridian, the start of the byway and the ferry dock for tours of Sapelo Island.

Fort King George

Built by the British in 1721, the oldest English fort remaining on Georgia’s coast, with a reconstructed blockhouse and museum.

Butler Island Plantation

Ruins of a famous rice plantation owned by Pierce Butler of Philadelphia. His wife, the English actress Fanny Kemble, described life here in her Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation.

Hofwyl-Broadfield Plantation

A state historic site preserving a rice plantation, its house and grounds under the live oaks, just off U.S. 17 near the south end of the byway.

Blackbeard Island National Wildlife Refuge

About 5,600 acres of maritime forest, salt marsh, freshwater marsh and beach, reached by boat.

Darien Waterfront

Shrimp boats, a riverside boardwalk and restaurants on the Darien River in one of Georgia’s oldest towns.

Directions

From I-95 Exit 58

Head east on GA 57, which becomes GA 99. The byway begins at the Sapelo Island Visitor Center and passes Ashantilly, Ridgeville, Carnigan and Meridian.