Most Virgin Islands are peaks of mountains with high elevations typically in the middle. But Anegada is flat - not a single hill in sight. It is a nearly deserted island (we are told only about 200 families live here) surrounded by coral reefs. Its name means "flooded land" because the island is suppose to flood a few times a year.

There is only one entrance to a vast bay in the south end of the island, well marked buoys because of the high risk of running into a coral reef. Charter boats are not allowed to sail to Anegada because of the risk of running into reefs. One ferry comes into the island 3 times a week only, bringing tourist from Tortola. It is a very secluded island and has the most beautiful beaches we have seen so far.

We sailed to this beautiful island on Wednesday, December 5 and stayed there until Friday. We took these days as "vacation days" and snorkeled for two days on Loblolly's beach which is in the north part of the island. Snorkeling here was wonderful. We saw just about every kind of coral reef fish - beautifully colored. We saw large fish as well and even swam with turtles. The reefs are very large and were everywhere near the beach and one had to be careful swimming away from the large peaks as the waves and current (fairly mild) pushed one in their direction.

The night before we left we went to the only other open shack on the beach serving food and joint in with people from a couple of other boats from our rally. We ate lobster for the first time since we arrived - lobsters here are 2+ pounds large and, unlike cold water lobsters, have no claws. We also listened to the only band in Anegada play Caribbean music. Daniel had a great time playing pool with the local guys. The pool table was very well used (pretty rugged in many places) but it worked and this was a center of attraction. So Daniel started playing and loosing against big men who play here often. However, toward the end of the evening he got better and actually won 1 game!