Turks and Caicos, a Melange of stunning blues

Many years ago, I asked a well travelled colleague of mine which was the most beautiful beach she’s ever been to. And without missing a beat, she said “Grace Bay, TCI”. That’s how I was introduced to this place. Even though the Caribbean is known for its turquoise waters and white sand beaches, in this trip I learned that all of them are not made the same. The beaches and Bays in TCI were so stunning that when I went to Bora Bora and remote uninhabited islands in Indonesia, I was subconsciously weighing them against the beaches in TCI. And to my surprise, there was no clear winner! That’s how underrated and beautiful this island was.

Some fun facts about TCI:

Conch is a big deal here, you will find the conch shells in bays and even has the world’s only conch farm! We saw some live ones in the mangrove kayaking tour we did (more on that later) and poor dead ones on almost everyone’s plates at restaurants.

One thing that shocked me was how EXPENSIVE it was to visit. A very normal villa on Airbnb (with a pool) cost upwards of $500 per night near Grace Bay. And the food was equally insane, we spent around $100 per meal for two people! After a day of eating out, we decided to go shop for some basics at Safeway and guess what, the almond butter jar was labeled at $26! So be prepared to spend a lot of money on Food/Accomodation when you plan a trip here.

Now moving on to the fun stuff, the beaches!! Ah, where do I start. When I stepped onto Grace Bay beach for the first time, I couldn’t believe how fine the sand was!! It legit was like flour, I’m not even exaggerating. It’s a super long bay with a bunch of resorts by the beach, so everyday we would watch sunset and walk by the beach and pick a restaurant to eat right there 🙂 It was absolute bliss! I’ve never enjoyed walking barefoot on a beach so much.

Regarding the things to do in TCI, I generally maintain this elaborate excel sheet with activities planned down to the hour for each day of my vacation. And since I’m just about a year or two late in updating this blog, I go back and refer to it to jog my memory. However, my TCI excel sheet is BLANK you guys, I’m in shock 😀 I didn’t realize how much of a relaxed trip this was (soo not my type) but good reminder for myself that I’m sometimes capable of taking things slow and actually chilling haha. We rented a car so that we could visit as many beaches as possible, and that IMO was the best part of this trip! Every 15 minutes you take a turn that would lead you to a stunning beach whose names I lost track of because honestly you cannot go wrong with any of the beaches in TCI! We only booked two activities – One Snorkel Eco tour which was AMAZING – my first time seeing fan corals and they were the most beautiful shade of purple!! The one thought I have every single time I surface after snorkeling is – Nature is the OG of artists! The second one was a Kayaking trip through the mangroves where we spotted a bunch of baby turtles and baby sharks swimming below our clear bottomed kayaks. I would totally recommend both these!

Now now, are you ready to be visually bombarded with all the possible shades of blues? 😉