About Anegada

Anegada is the second largest of the British Virgin Islands with an area of 15 square miles. The residential population is under 300 people. Unlike the mountainous islands of Tortola, Virgin Gorda, and Jost Van Dyke, the “sunken island” of Anegada is flat and formed of coral and limestone, and its highest point is 28 feet above sea level.

Most residents live in The Settlement, the island’s only village, and where you will find the ferry dock, shops, the harbour, a medical clinic, a post office, a police building, hotels, bars, restaurants, a library, and the Anegada Iguana Headstart Facility. At this facility, headed by the National Parks Trust, the critically endangered Anegada Rock Iguana, Cyclura pinguis, are being bred and reintroduced to the wild.

In addition to lizards and other amphibians, the island hosts hermit crabs, feral cattle, donkeys, goats, cows, and sheep as well as flocks of flamingos, pelicans, osprey, kestrels, frigate birds, herons, gulls, and warblers. Flora includes loblolly, frangipani, turpentine trees, feathery sea lavender, wild orchids, hibiscus, cacti, palm trees, and pines.

In Anegada, you will discover shades of blue that you never knew existed. The sparkling clear water covers white sand interspersed with thriving reefs. It’s not uncommon to see congregations of breeding nurse sharks in the shallows, as well as almost every breed of Caribbean fish, shellfish, turtle, snail, and coral. Snorkeling Horseshoe Reef is second to none, but the treacherous pass has also been home to hundreds of shipwrecks.

A hundred stately ships have found

their everlasting burial ground

upon the awful reefs and rocks

and from moles and graving docks

– Alphaeus O. Norman, “Horseshoe’s Reefs”

The lobster in Anegada is famous, and the island hosts an annual Lobster Festival. Outside of The Settlement, the island is mainly desolate and wild, but a few beach bars and restaurants pop up at Cow Wreck Beach and Loblolly Bay, and the more recent Anegada Beach Club offers seafront luxury tents, a hotel, beach bar, pool, and restaurant.

Anegada also hosts some of the best kite-surfing in the Caribbean.