The sugary sand beaches that bring millions of tourists to Alabama's Gulf Coast each year don't look as snow-white when they're topped with actual snow.

Baldwin County and much of southern Alabama had the visuals many associate with the coastal South flipped on their head this week when Winter Storm Enzo dumped more snow and plummeted temperatures lower than any day since the 1800s. Sand turned to snow. Precipitation impacting bridges over Mobile Bay was not due to flooding but rather icing. Fluffy white tufts nestled on branches as far as the eye could see at first glance looked like cotton, but another look revealed sights no one has seen for generations.

Mobile Regional Airport recorded a low of 6 degrees Wednesday morning, which ties for the third-coldest low temperature on record with Feb. 12, 1899, according to the National Weather Service Mobile Office. The all-time low for Mobile is -1 set that next day in the 1800s. The weather service says this was only the 11th time Mobile recorded a single digit low, with records going back to 1872.

By the time the snow stopped at Mobile Regional Airport Tuesday evening, 6.2 inches broke the all-time snowfall record. The weather service’s office in West Mobile recorded 7.5 inches.

Local levels ranged with that amount around a loose average, with readers and Gulf Coast Media staff measuring anywhere from 5 to nearly 10 inches across Baldwin County. The weather service is still gathering data for hyper-local snowfall amounts.

The historic storm ushered sightseers in flocks to the beach, to the dismay of city leaders, emergency response officials and first responders who urged people to stay off the roads as they became increasingly treacherous as the day and night went on.

Even Waffle House in Orange Beach and Robertsdale closed. Now that’s saying something when the 24/7 diner that stays open no matter what and is used by TV meteorologists as a hurricane severity index decides to take a snow day.

Locals – some of whom had never seen that much snow before, and visitors, many of whom snowbirds who took to social media to proclaim “I moved here to get away from this!” – took the snow day off work and school to build snow/sand men, take walks and, proudly playing to Lower Alabama’s Redneck Riviera reputation, even snowboard down the hill at Gulf Shores Public Beach. They took kayaks to roads and skim boards to parks. A truck could even be seen at night pulling a man through a neighborhood riding some type of large board.

Many people, lacking a regular need for ski clothes and mittens, improvised with rain boots, hunting jackets, blankets, a onesie and even socks for gloves.

Matt Hapitre, Alora McElroy, Raven Elliott and Harrison Moore tried sledding down the beach hill. Two of the four Gulf Shores residents had only seen snow once before.

Katrina Trahan and Sean Collins have lived here for about three years, having moved from up north. They couldn’t miss the opportunity to make a snowman on the shore.

Farther north, a live feed showed a snow-covered Fairhope Pier.

At Glenlakes Golf Club in Foley, it wasn't just the hazards that were devoid of green when the entire course looked like a bunker, save for a fluttering pin flag. Tropic Falls looked anything but tropic with fluffy snow covering logos with palm trees and bright always-summer colors.

A 25-year-old at The Wharf has lived here her whole life and had never seen snow before. She was making snowballs in the median.

A couple and their son have lived in Gulf Shores for 15 years but have always had to go to North Carolina, which they do every winter, to take the type of quiet nighttime walk they did on Tuesday.

By Wednesday, the snow had stopped falling and settled into a fluffy winter wonderland complete with the Gulf Coast’s resident master sand sculptor, Janel Hawkins of Sand Castle University, transforming temporarily into Snow Castle University with a demonstration on the beach. Farther east in Orange Beach, a charter boat captain displayed his 9-foot snowman.

Overall, though data and response efforts are still coming in after the roads refroze Wednesday night, no major disasters seemed to be reported.

Magnolia Springs Fire Rescue, a volunteer unit, responded to several incidents during the height of the storm on Tuesday, including a structure fire in the Vernant Park area on US Hwy. 98 where two residents had to be transported to the hospital for smoke inhalation and a cat was rescued and administered oxygen. All three are doing well now, according to the department.

“Foley is in great shape. People heeded the warnings and stayed off the roads generally. Hopefully, Thursday will allow operations to resume,” Mayor Ralph Hellmich said Wednesday.

David Wilson, Foley public safety executive director, said the conditions made responses difficult for some emergency units.

“The roads (Tuesday) and (Tuesday) night were in such rough shape that we had to have limited responses by police, fire and even the ambulance services on non-emergency calls,” Wilson said Wednesday. “Hopefully everyone had time to get what they needed from the store with all the advanced warning that was given.”

Orange Beach Mayor Tony Kennon drove around Wednesday to check on road conditions and said everyone he met on the way was “very courteous and safe.” He said he “knew it was bad when the Waffle House closed last night.”

Orange Beach’s bridges at the Foley Beach Express and Predido Pass remained open as of Thursday morning, but it still has “significant ice patches,” according to the Orange Beach Fire Department. Areas of Perdido Beach Boulevard, especially in front of Turquoise Place, have large ice patches that are “unavoidable.”

The W.C. Holmes Bridge where Hwy. 59 crosses the canal closed Tuesday and reopened Wednesday to one lane and intermittent crossings patrolled by city police, but they had warned it may close at a moment’s notice depending on the weather.

Kennon got about 8 inches at his home. He said “it’s been fun” to play in it with his family.

“My boy’s 18, and he’s never seen it before,” he said.

He said he feels like the kid in the “Christmas Story” movie “dressed like a tick” in the snow.

But, after all, we do all live down here for a reason.

“It’s like a vacation,” Kennon said. “It’s good for about two to three days, but by Friday you’re ready to go home.”

Enzo will certainly be a storm to remember for maybe generations. For Kennon, it’s just one more thing to add to the bucket list.

“Short of a herd of locusts or volcanoes,” he said. “we’ve seen everything.”