Islands of the Atlantic Ocean Voyage Tips and guide

Islands of the Atlantic Ocean number many thousands, scattered far and wide. However most of them are associated with a continental land mass, geographically perched on the same continental shelf and with transport and cultural links there, so it's obvious where to seek further travel information on them. The purpose of this page is to help you track down the less obvious examples, with several familiar ones added to help orientation. The most isolated rear up abruptly from the deep Atlantic floor through volcanic action, and new islands form from time to time.

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Islands of the Atlantic

• 65-191 Iceland is on the boundary, washed to the south by the Atlantic and to the north by the Arctic Ocean. It's well-developed for tourism, cold but not polar, and easy to reach by air. It straddles the rift where the Atlantic is widening, with active volcanoes and lunar scenery.
• Greenland to the west by contrast is one of the Islands of the Arctic Ocean - it dips its toe in the Atlantic but is ice-clad.
• Norwegian Sea east of Iceland is transitional: the last warm gasp of the Gulf Stream keeps it ice-free. But its islands (such as Jan Mayen) are more difficult to visit, so on these pages they're considered part of the Arctic.
• 62-6.82 Faeroe Islands are an archipelago between Iceland and Great Britain, on the boundary with the Norwegian Sea but easy to visit and explore.
• 47-56.23 Saint Pierre and Miquelon are a colonial oddity: a small archipelago just 19 km from Newfoundland and similar in terrain, but they're a territory of France.
• 38-27.54 Azores are an archipelago belonging to Portugal. The best developed island for tourism is São Miguel.
• 32.5-175 Madeira is the principal island and most developed of another Portuguese archipelago.

• 28-166 Canary Islands are a Spanish archipelago. Islands attracting mass tourism are Gran Canaria, Fuerteventura, Tenerife and Lanzarote.
• 16-247 Cape Verde is an independent nation, an archipelago 500 km west of Africa with Sal and Boa Vista its main islands for tourism.

(Macaronesia is a name sometimes applied to the Azores, Madeira, Canaries and Cape Verde islands, but no-one ever calls them that.)

• The Caribbean is a sea separated from the Atlantic by an arc of islands. So those islands have an east coast buffeted by the Atlantic, and a sheltered west coast on the Caribbean with the bulk of their population and visitor amenities. Culturally they're Caribbean and not described here, except for a few outliers.
• 32-658 Bermuda is a British territory over 1000 km east of the Carolina coast, a long way from the Caribbean but similar in its climate, colonial history and present tourist economy. Most of its 181 islands are linked by causeways.
• 24-789 Bahamas are an independent nation, a straggling archipelago that starts 100 km east of Florida and parallels the coastline of Cuba for 1000 km. New Providence is the most developed of its 3000 islands and islets.
• 21.5-7210 Turks and Caicos Islands 200 km north of Hispaniola are geographically the east tip of the Bahamas chain, but a British territory.

• 13-59.511 Barbados is another outlier, an island nation 150 km east of the Caribbean arc where the Atlantic is the "A"-word, not to be mentioned in tourist material in case anyone supposes the sea might ever be rough.
• 3.58.512 Bioko was formerly known as Fernando Pó. It's part of the African mainland nation of Equatorial Guinea, though that lies further south and Bioko is only 32 km from the coast of Cameroons.
• 0.866.9513 São Tomé and Príncipe are an island nation off Africa whose two main islands straddle the equator. Both have tourist amenities.
• Annobón is 150 km southwest of São Tomé and Príncipe and the closest mainland is Gabon, yet it's part of Equatorial Guinea. It's inhabited but has few visitor facilities.
• -3.85-32.414 Fernando de Noronha is 350 km east of Brazil but part of that nation. Much of it is a marine park.
• -20.5-29.32515 Trindade and Martim Vaz is a scattered archipelago 1100 km east of Brazil but part of it. It's rugged, desolate and uninhabited except for a small navy and research base.
• -7.94-14.3516 Ascension is a British territory, an isolated volcanic peak with a military airbase. It is possible to visit independently, but the sternest hurdle to entry is the authorities' first question: "Why??"

• -15.91-5.7117 Saint Helena is an even more isolated British territory, 2000 km west of Africa and 4000 km east of Brazil, yet is more developed and with regular flights from Johannesburg. The main visitor attraction is the living quarters of Napoleon, exiled here from 1815 to his death in 1821.
• -37.11-12.2818 Tristan da Cunha is even more isolated, a British territory 2800 km from Africa. There's no airstrip so getting here involves a long ocean crossing. It was briefly famous when its volcano erupted in 1961, and the entire population had to be evacuated for a couple of years.
• -51.7-59.2219 Falkland Islands are a British dependency 500 km east of Patagonia in Argentina. They're expensive to reach but you can fly here independently.
• -54.4-36.720 South Georgia is only 200 km further from the equator than the Falklands yet is icy, and considered one of the Islands of the Southern Ocean. These are all bathed in the current circling the Antarctic, now recognised as a separate ocean. Cruise ships returning from the Antarctic peninsula sometimes call here to see the wildlife. The other such islands are formidably difficult to get to, and then the task of getting back has just begun.