Families visit Mississippi Coast Railroad Museum for Christmas Eve

Some families took a different approach with Christmas Eve, opting to pay a visit to everyone’s favorite model railroad museum.

The facility made the quick decision to remain open Friday and Sunday and dazzle visitors with its light display.

Due to popular demand, the Mississippi Coast Model Railroad Museum is open for Christmas Eve.

The electronic models clacking along the railroad exhibits number in the hundreds.

Families had an array of reasons for bringing the kids to the museum’s holiday light show – from leaving the house after dinner to wanting to tire them out so they’d get some sleep on the big night.

Garbriall Kiel and her family simply wanted to see what the museum had to offer on their first visit. “It looks like a family-oriented type of museum, and it looks like you can just come together as a family and enjoy the trains and enjoy the scenes.”

Young David Luke and his family came out to satisfy an overwhelming curiosity. “It’s making me feel like a train engineer, like building the trains. I’ve got a huge model train at my pawpaw’s.”

Nothing makes the holiday quite like the sounds of model trains bumping down a set of well-maintained tracks – that especially goes for David. He particularly enjoyed the train that looped around the ceiling. “Well, my favorite part about it is like, it’s just there’s so many cool things about it, like, you get to watch it just go right over you.”

Mississippi Coast Model Railroad Museum President Richard Mueller Jr. said, “We’re the only one that has outdoor model trains running around. And people just like the combination of Christmas, and Christmas lights and trains.”

Though the museum saw a lot of traffic, all in all, it was a peaceful way to spend Christmas Eve.