Just
twenty years ago, the Turks and Caicos Islands were one of the
quietest and least-known destinations in the West
Indies. Today, on the back of classy development on Providenciales,
and great beaches and diving on all of the islands, they have
become one of the most fashionable places to visit in the region.
The country comprises two groups of islands - eight inhabited and
around forty uninhabited - separated by the Columbus Passage,
a
deep-water channel 22 miles wide and up to 6000 feet deep. To the
east, the
Turks Islands include Grand Turk and Salt Cay , the former the
long-time home to government, the latter a tiny island named for
the salt industry
that once dominated the country. To the west, the chain of Caicos
Islands includes inhabited South, Middle and North Caicos - each
with its own charms - and the fast-growing island of Providenciales
, known as Provo and home to the great majority of the nation's
tourist development.
The major attractions on all of the islands are concentrated along
their coasts: truly sensational white-sand beaches that stretch for
miles, and world-class diving, snorkelling and deep-sea fishing and
bonefishing. Inland, there's not much to see other than low-lying
scrubby vegetation and, particularly in the Turks Islands, large
expanses of featureless salinas, from which Bermudian settlers and
traders harvested salt during the islands' early development. |
