A rosey swath on Barbuda

As a beach lover, I’ve had the pleasure  of  enjoying  many beautiful shorelines, in many countries. I love pristine white sand beaches and I adore exotic black sand beaches but hands down, the most drop-dead gorgeous beaches I have ever gazed upon were on the tiny island of Barbuda.  An unspoiled, sparsely inhabited sister island to Antigua, Barbuda offers the most beautiful and serene beaches in North America.

Stretching for 11 miles nonstop, with hardly a beach towel or chair to mar its rosy glory, Barbuda’s beaches recall  true paradise.  There are lots of beaches on the island and some reveal pearly white sands but more with names like centerpiece and pink sand, present mounds of deeply hued blush-colored sand. I’m not talking slightly pink or almost pink ,like you find on Bermuda or Harbour Island. I mean true,cotton candy pink.  The color comes from crushed coral and tiny pink shells.  I keep bowls and bottles of it around my house to remind me of Barbuda’s pink sand loveliness. You can’t buy land in Barbuda, it’s all owned in common by Barbudians so the closest you can get to permanently capturing the idyllic beaches is by scooping up some of the pink sand and taking it with you.

Photo by Rosalind Cummings-Yeates