Discover Culebra and Puerto Rico's Top Beach Paradise

Thank you Luis Diaz Cruz for really good comments. I know now that I will avoid ferry and car and enjoy snorkelling on flamenco beach and other beaches.

IT'S PPL LIKE THIS THAT MAKE OTHER PPL NOT WANT TO VISIT SUCH BEAUTIFUL ISLAND I'VE BEEN TO THIS ISLAND AND IT'S THE MOST BEAUTIFUL ISLAND. THE BEACH IS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL BEACH ANYONE CAN SEE AND BE IN; IT'S VERY CLEAN,QUITE AND RELAXING.

Recently my wife and I spent a week in the idyllic island of Culebra. I had visited the island many times before when I was a kid but it was the first time for my wife. The Culebrenses are very hospitable and really nice people. There is really not much to do in the island but dive and snorkel which is exactlly what we planned to do and we did just that. Flamenco and the other beaches are to die for and we biked everywhere since there are only two roads in the island and it is pretty much flat land. Life there is very expensive and the residents have to sacrifice a lot for the comforts found in the big island. We are glad we biked since there is only one garage with very expensive gas and they ususally run out by Tuesday until the gas arrives from Fajardo late Wednesday. If you need to get gas, there is usually a half hour to 45 minute wait. There was a lot of garbage in the form of discarded water bottles and other throw away stuff around the island. The have an ecology school with solar panels and other enviromentally conscious features and a dedicated student population wich tells me most of this garbage comes from the outside. The residents are very worried with a new proposed project which will encompass over one thousand "cuerdas" of their land. The project will go from the north to the south coast literally dividing the island in two. They are worried about the environmental impact of such a proyect and the few benefits that it will bring the residents. Their main concern is that, due to the centralized form of government in PR the decisions regarding this development will be taken in San Juan by outsiders who do not understand or care about their plight and they will have no saying in the matter. I could not find one resident who was in favor of this project which seems to consume their conversations with outsiders. They have started a petition opposing the development which my wife and I signed even when we do not oppose progress. A month before our trip we checked the Culebra island blogs in the Internet because one big concern was the Ferry from Fajardo since we have heard horror stories about it.. All the bloggers recommended not to call the Ferry office because they never answer their phones. We tried many many times and Alas!, they NEVER answer their phones. I also tried once we arrived in the big island and they never answered either. The day we were to leave from Fajardo we arrived at Puerto Real at 5 AM and they already had people camped out waiting in line until they opened at 8 AM. People who were late cut in line and asked other people to buy tickets for them and there is no security and when asked, the state police said they had no jurisdiction in the matter that it was the Port Authority. There was no Port Authority security around either and we almost got bumped to the 3 PM Ferry, even tough we had arrived that early that morning. You can not buy them ahead of time and there is no Internet sales. Finally we took the Ferry, which went smoothly and coming back was not such an ordeal since we came back in the middle of the week. In our next visit we plan to take a plane from San Juan ( we did not do it this time because my wife is deathly afraid of the small planes) if I'm able to convince my partner to fly in one of them.