Frommers - AARP Abacos, Bahamas: Frommers Shortcuts

Opening up the world and the wonders in your own backyard.

Maybe youre finally planning that big trip youve dreamt of for years. Maybe youre ready to hop in the car and go where the road takes you. Or maybe youre visiting far-flung family and friends.

Welcome to travel for grown-ups. Where do you turn for help?

Dedicated to helping you enjoy and enrich your life through travel, AARP has teamed up with Frommers to offer the best advice on must-see destinations, from daytrips to journeys around the world. Well guide you to the best food, accommodations, shopping, nightlife, sights, and activities that suit your lifestyle.

And true to AARPs commitment to help you stretch your dollars, well show you how to get the best value, whether youre traveling near or far. Want to splurge on a fancy hotel and eat cheap, or vice versa? We offer all price ranges. And give you the flexibility to tailor your trip to your budget. Whatever you choose, whatever your budget, well make sure you have memorable and wonder-filled experiences.

So hit the road and enjoy every minute. Well show you the way.

About the Authors

Veteran travel writers, Darwin Porter and Danforth Prince, have written many popular guides to the Frommers series, including books on the Caribbean, France, England, Germany, and Italy. This travel team wrote the first-ever Frommers guide to The Bahamas, and also a number of other Frommers books to such island destinations as Bermuda, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Barbados, Dominican Republic, and the Cayman Islands. Porter is also a Hollywood biographer, film critic, broadcaster, and columnist. Prince was formerly employed in the Paris bureau of The New York Times and is the president of Blood Moon Productions.

Frommers Star Ratings, Icons & Abbreviations

Every hotel, restaurant, and attraction listing in this guide has been ranked for quality, value, service, amenities, and special features using a star-rating system. In country, state, and regional guides, we also rate towns and regions to help you narrow down your choices and budget your time accordingly. Hotels and restaurants are rated on a scale of zero (recommended) to three stars (exceptional). Attractions, shopping, nightlife, towns, and regions are rated according to the following scale: zero stars (recommended), one star (highly recommended), two stars (very highly recommended), and three stars (must-see).

In addition to the star-rating system, we also use seven feature icons that point you to the great deals, in-the-know advice, and unique experiences that separate travelers from tourists. Throughout the book, look for:

special finds those places only insiders know about

fun facts details that make travelers more informed and their trips more fun

kids best bets for kids, and advice for the whole family

special moments those experiences that memories are made of

overrated places or experiences not worth your time or money

insider tips great ways to save time and money

great values where to get the best deals

The following abbreviations are used for credit cards:
AE American Express
DISC Discover
V Visa
DC Diners Club
MC MasterCard

The Best of The Bahamas

The Bahamas (thats with a capital The) is one of the most geographically complicated nations of the Atlantic. Its a coral-based archipelago comprising more than 700 islandshundreds more if you count the rocky outcroppings that have damaged the hulls of countless ships since colonial days.

Made of more than 100,000 square miles of dry and sometimes barren land, the archipelago comprises The Bahama islands and also, in the south, the Turks and Caicos Islands, which maintain a separate government. Most of the population is centered on New Providence Island (Nassau/Cable Beach) and Grand Bahama Island (Freeport/Lucaya). Paradise Island, the most heavily developed tourist complex, lies directly off Nassau and is reached by a causeway.

The 760-mile-long chain of islands, cays, and reefs that make up The Bahamas stretches from Grand Bahama Island, whose western point is 75 miles almost due east of Palm Beach, Florida, to Great Inagua, southernmost of The Bahamas, which lies about 60 miles northeast of Cuba and less than 100 miles north of Haiti. Cay (pronounced key) is the Spanish word for small island.

Sandy beaches, fishing (some of the best in the world), boating, nearly perfect weather (even though the islands are in the often stormy Atlantic Ocean), and accessibility to the U.S. mainland put this archipelago on the world tourist map. The Bahamas lies right off the Florida coast. One 20- to 30-minute plane ride can free you from Miamis congestion as you land on Bimini.

The Bahamas is ideal for both quick 4- or 5-day jaunts and longer vacations, if youd really like to island-hop and see as much as you can.

In the 1940s, when the Duke and Duchess of Windsor ruled The Bahamas (after hed renounced the British throne), the islands were considered exclusive. Beginning in the 1960s, that reputation changed. Today the islands lure people from all walks of life, whether they want a $500-a-day luxury resort or prefer to rough it for $50-a-day on one of the little-visited Out Islands.

If youve decided that The Bahamas sounds like the perfect place to relax, feel free to start unwinding right now, because weve done all the legwork for you. Below youll find our carefully compiled lists of the best that The Bahamas has to offer, from beaches and dive sites to resorts, restaurants, and sightseeingand nearly everything else youll want to see and do.