Bay St. Louis calls itself ‘A Place Apart’. Walk Main Street and you’ll stop arguing

Bay St. Louis isn’t New Orleans’ little sister

Bay St. Louis sits on Mississippi’s Gulf Coast, about 60 miles northeast of New Orleans, and it has been quietly doing its own thing since French explorers arrived in 1699.

Around 9,300 people call it home, and the town’s motto is “A Place Apart.” That’s not a boast.

It’s a fact. Budget Travel named it one of the coolest small towns in America.

Southern Living put it on the best small towns list. You’ll understand both calls the moment you start walking Main Street.

French explorers named this bay for a king

The French got here first. Pierre Le Moyne d’Iberville and his brother Jean-Baptiste de Bienville established the first settlement in 1699 and named the bay for King Louis IX of France.

The town incorporated as Shieldsborough in 1818, then dropped that name for Bay St. Louis in the 1870s. It came close to becoming Mississippi’s state capital, losing to Natchez by a narrow vote.

Wealthy New Orleans families claimed it as their summer retreat through the 1800s, and that French-influenced history runs through everything here.

Old Town is made for an afternoon on foot

Main Street, Second Street, and Beach Boulevard make up Old Town, and you can cover all of it without a car. Art galleries, antique shops, and locally owned boutiques fill the blocks between those streets.

The municipal harbor and pier, opened in 2014, give you a place to stop and look out over the water.

Parking along the beach is free, which anyone who has driven the Gulf Coast before will tell you is not how things usually work down here.

Second Saturday turns the streets into a gallery

Once a month, Old Town shifts into a different gear.

On the second Saturday, galleries stay open late, local artists hang new work, and live music comes out of the venues and onto the streets. Food and drinks flow at stops along the route.

The crowd pulls from across the Gulf Coast region, locals and out-of-towners mixed together, moving from one lit-up doorway to the next.

If your visit lines up with one of these nights, plan to stay out later than you thought.

Ray Charles and B.B. King both played this Union Street hall

The 100 Men D.B.A. Hall went up in 1922 on Union Street, built by a group of Black civic leaders called the One Hundred Members Debating Benevolent Association, who had incorporated back in 1894.

During segregation, the hall became a stop on the Chitlin’ Circuit. Ray Charles played here.

So did James Brown, B.B. King, and Etta James. A Mississippi Blues Trail marker went up in 2011.

Today the hall runs as a nonprofit venue and cultural center, with live music, writing workshops, and community events filling the calendar.

Two churches you’ll want to step inside

Our Lady of the Gulf Catholic Church has stood on Beach Boulevard since 1847, its Romanesque front facing the Mississippi Sound.

Down on Necaise Avenue, St. Rose de Lima, founded in 1925, holds something you won’t find anywhere else on the coast: an altar mural showing an African Christ figure rising in front of a live oak tree.

The church is also home to a nationally recognized Southern gospel choir. Tours of St. Rose de Lima run by appointment, and they’re worth arranging before you go.

Six carved angel trees mark where Katrina hit hardest

Hurricane Katrina came ashore just west of Bay St. Louis on Aug. 29, 2005. The storm surge ran 28 to 30 feet.

The beachfront district took a direct hit. When the floodwaters pulled back, the oaks that survived were dead on their feet.

Chainsaw artist Dayle Lewis of Indiana came down and carved them into angels.

The most visited stands on Demontluzin Avenue, cut from a tree that three people and a dog held onto during the storm.

Six angel trees now stand at four locations around Old Town, including Cedar Rest Cemetery and in front of Our Lady of the Gulf.

The town rebuilt, and came back different

Katrina gutted Bay St. Louis. Homes, businesses, and historic buildings went with the surge.

Residents started rebuilding almost before the water was gone, using federal aid and their own hands. Many rebuilt higher, with stronger foundations.

The arts community moved fast: Gallery 220 reopened just five weeks after the storm.

The downtown that came back has new restaurants and shops standing next to restored historic buildings, and the whole thing holds together in a way the old version didn’t quite manage.

You can ride an Amtrak train straight into Old Town

Amtrak’s Mardi Gras Service launched Aug. 18, 2025, running twice daily between New Orleans and Mobile, Alabama, with a stop in Bay St. Louis.

It’s the first passenger rail on this stretch of Gulf Coast in nearly 20 years, since Katrina knocked out the previous service.

The train pulls into the historic L&N Train Depot, which also houses a visitor center and a Mardi Gras Museum.

A golf-cart taxi service called Downtown Dasher picks up passengers at the depot and runs them straight into Old Town.

Fish the Sound, walk the trail, or just sit on the sand

Bay St. Louis Beach runs along Beach Boulevard with white sand and gentle Gulf waves.

The Bay-Waveland Beach Trail stretches 4.5 miles along the coast to the town of Waveland, open to walkers and cyclists with water on one side the whole way.

Fishing charters out of the municipal harbor take you onto the Mississippi Sound and the Gulf, where the waters hold redfish, speckled trout, and blue crab.

You can do all three of these things in a single day and still have time for dinner.

Buccaneer State Park sits five miles down the road

Buccaneer State Park covers about 400 acres in Waveland, five miles south of Bay St. Louis, with beachfront land, moss-draped oaks, and marshlands all running together.

The Buccaneer Bay Waterpark inside the park runs a 460,000-gallon wave pool, waterslides, and a kids’ play area from Memorial Day through Labor Day.

A 1.8-mile nature trail cuts through oaks, magnolia, and pines, and you’re likely to spot pelicans, egrets, or osprey along the way.

The park also has an 18-hole disc golf course included with admission, plus more than 200 campsites, many with Gulf views.

Bay St. Louis stays with you longer than you expect

Visitors come from Louisiana, Alabama, Tennessee, and points beyond, and most of them leave saying the same thing: this town got under their skin.

The arts, the history, the seafood, the beach trail, the angel trees, all of it adds up to something that doesn’t feel assembled for tourists.

Bay St. Louis is walkable, affordable, and free of the crowds that pile into bigger Gulf Coast spots. It makes a quiet impression.

The kind that sticks.

Visit Bay St. Louis in Hancock County, Mississippi

You can reach Bay St. Louis by car via Interstate 10 at Exit 13, or by train on Amtrak’s Mardi Gras Service from New Orleans or Mobile.

Old Town centers along Main Street, Second Street, and Beach Boulevard, and you can cover most of it on foot once you arrive.

Key stops include the 100 Men Hall at 303 Union Ave., Our Lady of the Gulf Church on Beach Boulevard, the angel trees scattered through Old Town, and the L&N Train Depot at 100 S. Beach Blvd. Check the official website for current hours and event schedules before you go.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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