Anguilla: the Great Caribbean Escape

Anguilla has been featured as the #1 island in the Caribbean in Travel and Leisure for the past several years. So, what is the draw? Obviously, the island, like any of the Caribbean, is going to have pretty beaches, but there is much more under the surface.

Escaping the tourism

The saying is that Anguilla is where celebrities go to not be recognized and I can see why. The island is extremely quiet, boasting of 33 beautiful beaches with hardly a sole on them. There is no central town or walking district to go shopping. In fact, I never even found a souvenir shop to get a t -shirt because that is not what this island is for. There is no one hang out spot.

Rather, Anguilla has many beaches and every beach has its beach bars and restaurants lining them. The bars are fun, often with live music, and a great atmosphere. There are just enough people to make it fun but never crowded and the bars have fruity cocktails. Best part? Often no shoes required, lots of sand, and cornhole! The #1 beach bar in the world also calls Anguilla it’s home, the Dune Preserve on Rendezvous Beach.

There isn’t much to do in the middle of the island besides the road that takes you from beach to beach. In fact, the middle of the island seemed rather barren and desolate after hurricane Irma. That is O.K. though because the beaches are quite simply stunning and worth going to.

When you are on one of the beaches it really does feel like you are on some remote hideaway and you keep looking over your shoulder for the cruise ship and the tourists to discover how pretty Anguilla is, but they never come.

The beauty

Anguilla’s beauty comes from the white sandy beaches and perfectly clear blue water. All that lines the beaches are a few bars and restaurants, so the real beauty is out in the water. Often there is striking contrast from the light turquoise water and the deep blue where a coral reef lies beneath. Brush this up against white, white sand and you get a beautiful transition of colors where the sand meets the ocean and then the ocean meets the reefs. There are some light waves that really bring out the white of the sand.

I think pictures can only truly describe how beautiful this place is. The entire time, I just kept thinking what gorgeous pictures a drone could capture if I had one as they would better show all the different hues from an aerial view as the white sand meets the ocean. Next time!!

The snorkeling

The snorkeling is on par with much of the Caribbean in Anguilla if not slightly better. I saw turtles, stingrays, barracuda, octopus, a tiny reef shark, and hundreds of fish. The best snorkeling was at Little Bay, but I also went snorkeling at Meads Bay, East Shoal Bay, and Sandy Island. At times, especially around Meads Bay, the water was too choppy for my taste (I prefer glass). And I found East Shoal Bay to be too long of a swim for me as well. I slightly preferred other islands for their protected coves as Anguilla had more ‘waves’ than other places I have been. That being said, Little Bay was truly spectacular.

The diving

As a newly certified scuba diver, Anguilla is the first place I went diving as an official open water scuba diver! While I don’t have much to compare to, I can say that I was blown away by the diving in Anguilla. We did a two-tank dive and both dives were wreck dives which Anguilla is known for. I guess many of the Caribbean islands you can do reef dives but what is unique to Anguilla is the wreck dives. The boats were purposely sunk to form this marine park under water. Coral is growing over the side of the boats to make it truly astonishing to look at under water.

The first dive had a max depth of 80ft, and the second dive had a max depth of 60ft. The water is SO warm and calm compared to diving in California. I enjoyed it much better because it always provides more of a comforting feeling being warm and being able to see the surface. Being relaxed as a new diver is important for me! We did enter the water by sitting on the edge of the boat and flipping over backwards to get in, which was a new entry method for me that I had only read about. The water at the surface has a little tiny bit of waves but you almost immediately descend and do not notice them anymore.

During the wreck dives, you can go up and down the boats length and width seeing all the nooks and crannies. There are plenty of fish, turtles, stingrays, lobster, barracuda, octopus, and fish to keep you plenty occupied!

Sandy Island

The highlight of a trip to Anguilla for me was Sandy Island, because I believe there is no place like it and it is very unique to Anguilla. You go to Sandy Ground beach and take a ‘ferry’ to this small island for $10. Ferry is a light term for a small 20ft boat and island is a light term for a patch of sand not even a few hundred feed long and wide. You can see 360 views of the ocean and this is the epitome of what Anguilla stands for: escaping. You feel like you are in some remote, far off destination when you are here – well because you are!

Sandy Island has one beach shack that has a bar and restaurant with live music going. There are plenty of beach chairs as well. There is an eb and flow of people all day, but it is never more than a few people on the island at once. Take the first boat of the day and you will literally find yourself to be the only one on the island. As the day goes on, private boats will come in with a few people stopping to take pictures and then continuing on their way. The island somewhat reminds me of a much much quieter, more remote, and smaller cousin of Jost Van Dkye in the BVIs.

To top it all off, the island is surrounded by a coral reef. The reef is never more than a few feet deep wherever you go and has some good snorkeling. This is where I saw the small reef shark!

Sailing

The final lure of Anguilla is getting out on the water and sailing. Unfortunately, the day we picked to sail it just DOWNPOURED. The sky was falling on us which you would think would have ruined the day, but it ended up being a great trip. This is because you could jump off the boat into the water (which is warmer than the rain) and go snorkeling. This is when we got to see Little Bay and I am SO glad we did because sailing brought you to the best snorkel spots. There is also a bar on the boat and people had a great time! We were supposed to go to Prickly Pear island but unfortunately had to go elsewhere due to the weather. We stopped at a cute little beach with a volleyball net and more snorkeling and a restaurant to eat at.