A set of islands in the Caribbean, Turks and Caicos offers beautiful white sand beaches with calm ocean waters. We visited the island of Providenciales via a connecting flight out of Charlotte. 

Grace Bay Beach is known for being one of the nicest beaches in the world, and it lived up to it’s reputation. Although it has a slightly more touristy feel than some other beaches on the island, such as Long Bay or Taylor, it was still perhaps my favorite place to spend the day. The best spot at sunset was Pelican Beach, which has nice rock formations, numerous conch shells, and resident pelicans which perch on posts in between dive fishing for food. The pelicans are the bosses of the air here, and any sea gull that lands on a post must move when a pelican wants it’s spot. The island also has snorkeling opportunities in several locations. It’s a good idea to bring your own gear, but try it out before coming so you know it works. You can also rent equipment, but purchasing it is relatively inexpensive and worthwhile if you are planning on going out more than once. Bring a life vest so that you can go out in the deep areas and not get tired. We enjoyed snorkeling at Smith’s reef and seeing the beautiful coral, a multitude of small fish species, eagle rays, turtles, and barracuda. I spent several hours in the water over a two day period and seemingly saw a new species of fish every 15 minutes or so. It was exciting to see my first eagle ray, who swam gracefully  about 15 feet below me and finally disappeared from sight maybe 70 feet ahead, only to circle back around a final time.