Keeping Scenic 98 Scenic

U.S. Highway 98 was initially built in 1933 as a route from Pensacola to Apalachicola. It has since been extended, and now runs 964 miles southeast from Natchez, Mississippi to Palm Beach, Florida. Beginning at the Causeway in Mobile, heading east, Scenic 98 hugs some of the most beautiful coastlines along the Gulf of Mexico to St. Marks, Florida. This is a drive worth taking.

Over the years, this area has become a magnet for vacationers in the summer. More recently, visitors enjoy the Gulf Coast in Spring and Fall. And now, more and more people are choosing this area as their permanent, year-long residence. Over time, the quiet hamlets of Panama City, Destin, and Gulf Shores gave way to high-rise condos, and more goods and services entered the market.

The Panhandle, as we know it, has changed a lot in my lifetime. There are still a few areas along Scenic 98 Coastal that have remained untouched, although it seems there is a lot of pressure to over-develop. One of our goals at Scenic98Coastal.com is to raise awareness of what makes this area so special and encourage smart decisions to help keep it that way.

What makes Scenic 98 so special? If you take the Causeway east you will pass one of the most biodiverse areas in the world. The Mobile River Delta, America’s Amazon, is an incredible 300,000 acres of swamps, marshes, and river bottomlands that are so impressive that Congress named the Delta a National Natural Landmark. There are many ways to explore and learn about what it means to the health of the waters it feeds and the plants and animals that call it home.

As you travel along the Eastern Shore of Mobile Bay along Scenic 98, you enjoy beautiful old Live Oaks with Spanish moss swaying in the breeze. Before the Causeway was built, people from Mobile ferried across the Bay to landings along the Eastern Shore. Names like Zundel’s Wharf and Battles Wharf were points where they docked so folks could find respite from the heat because temperatures were a good ten degrees cooler with summer breezes off the water.

Fishing villages were permanent residents back in the day. Fishing and farming families settled the land and continue to thrive today. Names like Malbis, Allegri, Corte, Manci, and Higbee come to mind. Towns like Spanish Fort, Daphne, Montrose, Fairhope, and Point Clear dotted the shoreline with bare necessities to offer visitors. Other communities were linked by their family heritage, whether Greek, German, Swedish, or Italian.

As a boy, we would spend summers with cousins at the Little Lagoon in Gulf Shores. Foley was the closest town with a grocery store. We subsisted on PB&J sandwiches and powdered milk, games of Crazy 8s, read comic books on army cots, took trips to explore Fort Morgan, and walked the beaches looking for treasured bottles that washed up with hopes they would include a written note to tell us about its travels.

The creeks and rivers, the bays, and the beaches all along Scenic 98 were what we did. We stayed in the water wherever we were. Seafood was harvested, cleaned, and eaten promptly, especially after a jubilee.  We feasted on locally grown tomatoes, corn, squash, and watermelon. We drove dune buggies on the beaches and there wasn’t a house in sight. Times were different then.

Fortunately, we have preserved a lot of the natural lands along the way. They are beautiful and inspiring with their wildlife and fauna. Where else can you fish for speckled trout in the morning and dove hunt in the afternoon, just a few miles apart? The drive along Scenic 98 through the Eastern Shore and Pt. Clear to Elberta and Lillian into Pensacola are important reminders of why we must keep Scenic 98 scenic. We must be diligent and smart about what we have and how we can protect it.

After all, that’s why we are here.

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