Skidaway Island State Park, one of Georgia's loveliest state parks, is located about 20 minutes south of downtown Savannah. Nearby attractions include the Wormsloe State Historic Site, Tybee Island, the Fort Pulaski National Monument, the Wassaw National Wildlife Refuge and the Savannah Historic District. The island can be reached from U.S. Highway 80 south of Savannah.
Skidaway Island is one of Georgia's barrier islands, a chain of islands that lines the entire coast of Georgia. It has an archaeological record going back to the Pleistocene epoch, with fossils of giant armadillos, mastodons and woolly mammoths found in the local waters around the island. The island's human activity goes back at least 4,000 years to the Timucua Indians. The 588-acre state park borders Skidaway Narrows, a former tidal creek that is now part of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, on the west side of the island. The park was opened in 1975, after the property was transferred to the state of Georgia from the timber company that owned most of the island.
The state park is an ideal spot to learn about Georgia's coastal history and ecology. Features of the park include:
87 tent/RV campsites and one group pioneer campsite
Five small picnic shelters and one group picnic shelter that has heat, air conditioning and a separate kitchen area and seats 150
Three playgrounds
A nature center which features a replica of a giant ground sloth, live reptiles, artifacts found on the island and a birding room
The Sandpiper Nature Trail, a one-mile, easy loop which follows a boardwalk built over the marsh
The Big Ferry Nature Trail, which the Sherpa Guide calls "one of the best trails on the Georgia coast.'' The three-mile loop "takes hikers through beautiful pine and maritime forest, across freshwater sloughs, past Prohibition-era liquor stills, and to a Civil War mortar battery before looping back past an observation tower.''
A wide variety of interpretive programs and guided walks for both children and adults, covering the island's history and ecology
The state park is part of the Colonial Coast Birding Trail. The Savannah Morning News has named the park as one of the top places in the state to watch birds. Large birds of prey, like bald eagles and ospreys, may be present in the park year-round. Ducks and loons winter over in the park, and songbirds use the island as a waystation during their spring migrations. In the summer, observers may see such colorful nesting birds as the painted bunting, bluebird, summer tanager and orchard oriole.
Reviews of Skidaway Island State Park are overwhelmingly positive. The Sherpa Guide calls it "one of the best state parks in Georgia, with two breathtakingly beautiful nature trails and a full complement of facilities.'' Visitors to the park who have reviewed it on the Internet find it peaceful and beautiful, with generally good facilities and an excellent staff. The playgrounds and activities are also popular. One reviewer says, "We found this [state park] to be one of the best we have ever visited!'' RVers have one of the few complaints, saying that the roads to the campsites are narrow and a bit difficult to navigate. Frommer's Best RV and Tent Campgrounds in the U.S.A. gives the park five stars for both tent and RV camping, saying, "It is a glorious, beautiful place ... For history and/or nature nuts, this is a supreme vacation spot.''
