Beach trip on Tybee: where a small group should stay

If the beach is the point of the trip and there are four of you, the short answer is the Tybee Beachside Condo: two bedrooms, sleeps four, on Tybee itself, a minute's walk from the sand. If your group is bigger than four, or you want a pool, or you're bringing a dog, the better move is a house on the islands between the city and the beach, about fifteen minutes back along Highway 80. Both of those are real options in our portfolio and they lead to genuinely different trips, so it's worth knowing which one you're buying.

The one where you park the car and don't touch it again

Our Tybee condo sits on the beach side of Highway 80, the single road that carries everyone onto the island. That detail decides more than it sounds like it should. Being on the ocean side means you cross nothing to reach the water and you walk to dinner instead of hunting a space, which in July, on an island served by one road, is the difference between a relaxed week and a tactical one.

It's a top-floor end unit, which in a condo building means neighbours on one side rather than two. Two bedrooms, four people. As the manager who handles the arrivals puts it: the whole group gets to everything from here, with easy access to the beach and walkable dining.

What's within reach on foot depends on where you want to be on the island. South Beach is the busy end, with the pier and pavilion, the Marine Science Center, lifeguards and restrooms, and the shops and bars stacked a few blocks deep. North Beach, up by the lighthouse, has a parking lot, restrooms and showers, a surf break past the rock jetties, and North Beach Bar & Grill at 33 Meddin Drive. The Back River on the southwest tip is shallow and calm, which is where you go with small children and where everyone goes at sunset.

Five people, a dog, or a pool: look at the islands in between

Tybee has one road in. Everything we manage west of it, on Wilmington and the neighbouring islands, trades walk-to-sand for space, parking and a fenced yard. For a lot of small groups that's the right trade, and the drive is short: head east out of the driveway for North Beach, west for River Street.

• Dogs Welcome! Coastal Oasis Pool near Beach & City, on Wilmington Island, is a single-level four-bedroom with a saltwater pool that's open all year (it isn't heated, which matters in March more than in August). The backyard is fully fenced, so the dog can be off the lead while you're grilling. There's air hockey indoors for the afternoon a storm rolls through, a high chair if you need one, and room for four cars.
• Newly Renovated Savannah Home, 15 Min to Beach is the one for a group that outgrows four bedrooms' worth of beds: seven beds across four rooms, a dining room that seats six plus a breakfast nook for four, and a fully fenced backyard. Dogs are welcome. Off-street parking for three cars, which solves the problem of arriving in two or three vehicles from different directions.
• Coastal Comfort is the smaller, quieter version: three bedrooms, a king and two queens, parking for two cars, a Kroger five minutes away. The backyard is dog-friendly but not fully fenced, and it backs onto a pond with an open gate, so a dog needs watching out there. Worth knowing before you book rather than after.

One practical note about all three: the roads out here have no sidewalks. You'll drive or call a car for everything, including dinner. That's the real cost of the extra bedroom and the pool.

How the island actually eats

Plan one night at The Crab Shack, which is peel-and-eat seafood beside an alligator lagoon and is technically on Whitemarsh Island, about ten minutes back toward town on Highway 80. If you're staying on Wilmington or Whitemarsh, it's closer to you than to the beach houses.

On Tybee, Sundae Cafe on First Street does Southern cooking in a small room and is known for crab-stuffed shrimp. Fannie's on the Beach, on Strand Avenue, is the loud, fun one with ocean views, seafood nachos and fish sandwiches. Sting Ray's has an umbrella deck and live music. Out at the Lazaretto Creek marina, about ten minutes from the beach end of the island, Bubba Gumbo's does shrimp po'boys and gumbo from a counter with a porch over the creek. Back River Brewery is the island's craft beer stop, and Doc's has been a dive bar on the main strip since 1948. Breakfast at Sunrise Restaurant fills up by nine, so send someone early.

Dolphin boats run from the Back River and from Lazaretto Creek. Take the late-afternoon one: it passes the lighthouse and Fort Pulaski with the light behind you.

The two days that aren't beach days

Fort Pulaski sits on Cockspur Island, three miles west of Tybee off Highway 80, a restored brick fort with a museum and trails worth an hour of wandering. The Tybee Island Lighthouse and Museum is at the north end; it's 178 steps to the top. The Marine Science Center runs guided walks on the beach and through the marsh if you have anyone in the group who wants to know what they're looking at.

Downtown Savannah is about half an hour from the island on a good day, longer on summer weekends and festival weekends, when Highway 80 backs up badly between roughly ten and noon. Leave early or leave late. Forsyth Park and Bonaventure Cemetery both sit between the beach and River Street, so they stitch neatly into the drive in either direction.

Something other than a beach house

Not every group wants a condo. We also keep an award-winning 1902 church conversion in Thunderbolt, the shrimp-boat town on the water just east of the city, which carries a Historic Savannah Foundation Preservation Award and puts you near Bonaventure Cemetery and Savannah Bend Marina. At the other end of the spectrum there's a limited-edition 2015 Airstream parked on nearly an acre of private land, midway between downtown and the beach, which is the cheapest way into this portfolio and the oddest.

Both are better as a couple's trip or a two-person add-on than as a base for four adults heading to the sand every morning. If the beach is the whole plan, stay with the condo or one of the island houses.

Three questions to settle before you book

Count your beds, not your bedrooms. The Wilmington Island pool house and the four-bedroom with seven beds hold different-sized groups despite the same bedroom number, and that's where most group bookings go wrong.

Decide whether you'll drive to the beach. On Tybee you won't need to. Anywhere west of the bridge, you will, every day, in summer traffic on a single road.

Then check the dog situation specifically rather than generally. Fenced and dog-friendly are not the same thing, and pet fees and house rules vary by home, so read the listing you're actually booking. Booking direct with us is the straightforward route, and the current savings terms are shown on the booking page.