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We feature special travel plans
on the following locations -
Antigua, Anguilla, Aruba, Bahamas,
Barbados, Bermuda, British Virgin
Islands, Cayman Islands, Dominican
Republic, Grenada, Guadeloupe,
Jamaica, Puerto Rico, St. Kitts,
Turks and Caicos, Trinidad & The
U.S. Virgin Islands.
The Caribbean (Spanish: Caribe;
French: Caraïbe; Dutch: Cariben) is
a region of the Americas consisting
of the Caribbean Sea, its islands
(most of which enclose the sea), and
the surrounding coasts. Located
southeast of Northern America, east
of Central America, and to the north
and west of South America, the
Caribbean is commonly reckoned as a
subregion of North America.
Situated largely on the Caribbean
Plate, the area comprises more than
7,000 islands, islets, reefs, and
cayes. The West Indies consist of
the Antilles, divided into the
larger Greater Antilles which bound
the sea on the north and the Lesser
Antilles on the east, and the
Bahamas which are northeast of the
sea. Bermuda lies much further to
the north in the Atlantic Ocean and
is sometimes included in the West
Indies. Geopolitically, the West
Indies are organized into 28
territories including sovereign
states, overseas departments, and
dependencies. At one time, there was
a short-lived country called the
Federation of the West Indies
composed of ten English-speaking
Caribbean territories.
The name "Caribbean" is named
after the Caribs, one of the
dominant Amerindian groups in the
region at the time of European
contact during the late 15th
century. The analogous "West Indies"
originates from Christopher
Columbus' idea that he had landed in
the Indies (then meaning all of
south and east Asia) when he had
actually reached the Americas. The
Spanish term Antillas was commonly
assigned to the newly discovered
lands; stemming from this, "Sea of
the Antilles" is a common alternate
name for the Caribbean Sea in
various European languages.
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