Your Life - Special Packages - Guide To Gulf Coast Living

Saturday, Jun. 20, 2009

Moss Point offers waterfront living

By Sarah Cure

Sun Herald

Known for its captivating downtown waterfront on Main Street, Moss Point is a historically rich community built around the Escatawpa and Pascagoula rivers in Jackson County. It was incorporated on May 20, 1901, and was originally named “Mossey Point” by early settlers who recognized the area’s Spanish moss-covered Live oak trees that bordered bayous, lakes and rivers.

As visitors veer off I-10 and drive across the Miss. 613 bridge, also known as the Main Street Bridge, the first sight at the foot of the bridge is a new restaurant, Rachel’s Widow’s Walk Restaurant. Named after a 134-foot schooner called Rachel that was built in 1918 by Moss Point’s own De Angelo and Sons Shipyard, the restaurant overlooks the Escatawpa River and has 15 boat slips and an open dock for all traveling boaters. They offer baked goods, hamburgers and seafood, with live music on weekends.

“We have a good view and good people,” said Jennifer Scarbourough, Moss Point native and restaurant server. “It is a real friendly type of place located in a nice, low-pace small town where everybody knows everyone.”

Sam Craft, a real estate appraiser and owner of the restaurant, said the Escatawpa is what called him home to Moss Point after 17 years.

“This is the best waterfront on the Mississippi Gulf Coast,” he said. “You can get more houses for the dollar here than any other community in South Mississippi and because of that, it’s a great retirement community.”

Craft said the area has a lot of “snowbirds.” One of them is David Howkins from La Grange Park, Ill., who bought a sailboat that was marooned on a nearby island.

“The people here, who were strangers to me, gave me a tow and have been family ever since,” Howkins said. “It felt so wonderful to have people come to your aid.”

Farther down Main Street, the city’s boardwalk is situated along the river’s edge. Locals, like William Jackson, go there twice a week to catch croaker, bass and sometimes redfish.

Across Main Street from the boardwalk is a strip of stores. One of them, Scordino’s Main Street Market, specializes in gourmet food, gifts and Mississippi pottery. Owners Philip and Sally Scordino of Moss Point say business is good and it attracts people from all over.

“It (Moss Point) has great potential because it’s a quick exit off I-10, has beautiful waterfront subdivisions, locally owned shops and the river,” Philip Scordino said.