Bermuda

Entry is simple and free. The COVID-era paid Travel Authorisation was abolished in November 2022; air arrivals now complete only the free Bermuda Arrival Card online in the days before travel, generating a confirmation but no fee and no approval wait. Cruise passengers skip even that.

There’s no visa for US, UK, Canadian or EU visitors (commonly up to 90 days, with an onward ticket), and nothing to convert on arrival — the Bermudian dollar is pegged 1:1 to the US dollar and US cash is used interchangeably.

Fill in the free Arrival Card a day or two before you fly — it’s quick, but it’s expected at check-in, and leaving it to the airport is the one avoidable snag. Don’t pay any site that charges a “Travel Authorisation” fee; that requirement ended in 2022 and the current card costs nothing.

Getting the geography right changes what you pack and when you go: Bermuda is a subtropical mid-Atlantic island, not a Caribbean one. It’s a quick flight from the US East Coast and a single, compact destination — a narrow, 35-km fishhook of linked islands with one airport and no onward island-hopping.

That compactness is the appeal — everything is close — but the no-car rule (next section) means “close” still takes planning by bus and ferry.

Pack for a subtropical shoulder climate, not the tropics, especially outside high summer — evenings are breezy, the sea is cool in winter, and a light layer earns its place. The one airport means no domestic connections to fret over; it’s wheels-down and straight into the (car-free) logistics.

The South Shore is one long run of pink-sand beaches, and they’re the reason most people come. Horseshoe Bay is the busy, fully-serviced headliner; a short walk west, Warwick Long Bay is longer and calmer, with the jewel-box Jobson’s Cove tucked beside it. All are public and free to walk onto.

Because the island is so small, you can hop between several South Shore beaches in a day — the one catch being that you’ll do it by bus, scooter or minicar, not a hire car.

The pink is subtler than the brochures — strongest in soft morning or evening light and where shell fragments collect, not a neon stripe. Go early at Horseshoe Bay to beat the cruise-day crowds, and walk the coastal path west to Warwick Long Bay and Jobson’s Cove for the quieter, prettier end.

• Reaching the South Shore beachesSkipwaiting for a taxiGothe pink bus along the South Road, or a scooter
• Crossing to the DockyardSkipthe long bus ride aroundGothe fast ferry across the Great Sound
• Door-to-door with luggageSkipthe bus with bagsGoa taxi (pricey) or a rented minicar

Buy a multi-day Transport Pass on arrival rather than paying per ride — at US$5 a single long trip, two or three journeys a day make the 1-day (US$19) or 7-day (US$62) pass pay for itself. Scooters are the local way to roam freely, but the roads are narrow and crashes are a notable visitor-injury source, so ride cautiously.

Hamilton is the small, walkable capital on the central harbour — Front Street shopping, ferries, and the island’s dining. At the east end, St George’s is the historic heart: founded in 1612 after the wreck of the Sea Venture, it’s the oldest continuously-inhabited English town in the New World and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, with the old State House and Georgian lanes.

At the west end, the Royal Naval Dockyard — the former Royal Navy base — is now the cruise port and home to the National Museum of Bermuda inside its ramparts. Between them, the Crystal Caves are the island’s one great underground sight.

The three set-pieces sit at the two ends and the middle of a long, thin island, so chain them by ferry and bus rather than backtracking: ferry to the Dockyard, bus or ferry along to Hamilton, and a separate day east to St George’s and the caves. The Crystal Caves combo ticket (US$35) covers both caves if you’re already out that way.

Bermuda runs on a summer-beach, quiet-winter calendar that a Caribbean regular won’t expect. The water is swimmable May to October, warmest June to September; the winter (December–March) is cool and windy, with a swathe of hotels and restaurants simply shutting for the season.

The shoulders — April–May and September–October are the sweet spot: warm enough to swim, quieter, and cheaper. Hurricane season (June–November) overlaps high summer, but the island’s strict building codes and preparedness mean a storm is a disruption, not a catastrophe.

Money is frictionless — the Bermudian dollar is pegged 1:1 to the US dollar, and US cash is accepted everywhere, so there’s nothing to convert. The sting is the cost of living: an isolated island that imports almost everything, Bermuda prices lunches, taxis and rooms well above both US and Caribbean levels.

Restaurants and hotels typically add a service charge of around 15–17%, so check the bill before tipping again, and budget structurally high. The relief is that the best of Bermuda — the pink beaches, the St George’s lanes, the Dockyard ramparts — is free; the buses and ferries are the cheap way to reach all of it.

Lean on the free and the public to balance the budget: beaches, historic towns and coastal paths cost nothing, and the Transport Pass moves you between them cheaply. The money goes on rooms and restaurants — so a smaller guesthouse and the odd picnic from a grocery do more here than on almost any island.

Bermuda packs an outsized amount beyond the sand. It has one of the highest golf-course densities on earth — around nine courses on 54 km² — and the clear, reef-ringed water makes it the wreck-diving capital of the Atlantic, with hundreds of shipwrecks from Spanish galleons to Victorian steamers.

The character is distinctly British-colonial: Bermuda shorts worn semi-formally with long socks and a jacket, afternoon tea, cricket (the Cup Match is a national event), and pastel limestone cottages with the white stepped roofs that catch rainwater. The “Bermuda Triangle” is folklore — no agency recognises any genuine excess of disappearances.

If you dive, bring or rent gear for the wrecks specifically — the shallow, clear-water wreck sites are Bermuda’s underwater signature, unlike the reef-and-wall diving of the Caribbean. And don’t take the Triangle seriously: it’s a tourist-shop motif, not a hazard, and locals treat the whole idea with a shrug.