A Guide to the Mississippi Barrier Islands – Lonely Planet
I first came to know the Mississippi barrier islands through art.
When I drive between Texas and Florida to visit my daughter, I’m always looking for an interesting stop during my road rip. That’s how I found the Walter Anderson Museum of Art in Ocean Springs, Mississippi – and the works of artist Walter Anderson pulled me in. His vivid watercolors and drawings of birds, waves, fish and coastal wilderness made me want to see the place that inspired them. That place was Horn Island, one of the Mississippi barrier islands.
Beginning in the 1940s, Anderson repeatedly rowed himself across open Gulf waters to Horn Island in a small skiff, camping alone beneath the overturned boat and filling notebooks with drawings and observations.
I see why Anderson was so drawn to the place. For while Horn Island and the other Mississippi barrier islands sit about 12 miles offshore, once you’re surrounded by nothing but water, sky and white sand, they feel much, much further away. In the best possible way.
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