acut2660 wrote:
Looking for some suggestions on where to go. Looking at the week of December 28th. Been looking into St. Augustine, Hilton Head, and Savannah. Young family with kids. Thanks in advance for all the suggestions.
I-95 south between Christmas and New Years is often a mess on any day. If you plan to go down I-95, I would recommend getting past Northern VA by 7 am to avoid the traffic. Between Christmas and New Years, anytime we've left NJ to go back home and haven't left at 3 am, we have gotten burned with miserable traffic.
Last year we decided not to leave at 3 am and it took us 15 hours to get home. When we leave at 3 am, it usually takes about 12 hours. We are waiting until a few day's after New Years to go home this year, but we'll probably still leave at 3 am.
As for where to go, St. Augustine or Hilton Head would be my suggestion. The weather in St. Augustine will be a little warmer. The ocean water temp will probably still be warm enough for the kids. We live about 150 miles north of St. Augustine and our kids swim in the ocean pretty much year round.
Savannah is a neat city to visit for a day, but after that, there isn't too much. Savannah isn't far from Hilton Head, so if you stayed in Hilton Head, you could take a day trip to Savannah and see everything in one day.
You could also consider Brunswick, GA as a home base. It's 1.5 hours south of Hilton Head, 1 hour south of Savannah and 2 hours north of St. Augustine. There is also St. Simon's Island and Jekyll Island 15 - 20 minutes from Brunswick. If you don't mind running around.
If you just want to sit back and relax, I'd recommend one of the campgrounds along A1A in St. Augustine, like
North Beach. You can walk across A1A to the beach and there is a pretty decent seafood restaurant along the beach across from the campground called The Reef.
-Michael