Turks & Caicos

These oddly named and misshapen islands may not be the prettiest in the Caribbean, covered as they are with cactus and thorny acacia trees. They are, however, fringed with exquisite beaches and several hundred miles of coral reef that keeps the Turks and Caicos on the world's top 10 dive list.

In 1965 the capital city's telephone operator was also the local jailer and the communications network was a hand-cranked telephone in a wooden shack. Since then, Karaoke and Club Med have arrived, but most of the archipelago remains rural and undeveloped, swinging along to its own bucolic pace.