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To split a geographical hair, The Bahamas is not part of the Caribbean, as many people think. Rather, it is part of the North American plate and is bordered to the east by the Atlantic Ocean and to the west by the Gulf Stream. No matter - we'll fudge it and say vaguely that the islands are 'in the West Indies', lumping them in with all the islands between north and south America. Politically, The Bahamas is considered part of the Caribbean - not least by its own government.

The Bahamas archipelago rises from the Bahama Banks, a vast and uniformly flat underwater platform, and consists of some 700 islands and nearly 2500 small islets or cays sprawled across roughly 259,000 sq km (100,000 sq mi) of ocean. The archipelago stretches 1200kms (750mi) south from Walker's Cay, (which is about 1027kms (750mi) east of Florida's Palm Beach), to the Ragged Island Range, which lies 80kms (50mi)northeast of Cuba and 88.5kms (55mi) north of Haiti. In all this vastness, the islands together add up to no more than 13890 sq km (5363 sq mi) of land (about the size of Connecticut). The mostly linear islands are strewn in a general northwest-southeast string. Great Abaco, Eleuthera, Long Island, Andros - are are as much as 160kms (100mi) long, but few are more than a couple of kilometres wide. All are low lying, the terrain either pancake-flat or gently undulating. Cat Island's Mt Alvernia, the highest point in the Bahamas, is only 62.7m (206ft) above sea level.

Virtually all of the islands are surrounded by coral reefs and sand banks. Most have barrier reefs along the length of their windward (eastern) shores that offer protection from Atlantic waves. These shores are lined virtually their entire lengths by white- or pinkish-sand shelving into turquoise shallows. Many islands are pockmarked by giant sinkholes called blue holes - water-filled, circular pits that open to underground and submarine caves and descend as much as 600ft (180m).

Bahamas

The original inhabitants of The Bahamas were the Lucayans, a tribe of the Arawak Indian group, who arrived near the turn of the 9th century. The peaceful Lucayans lived primarily off the sea, fishing and harvesting shellfish, conch, lobster and molluscs. Christopher Columbus planted the Spanish flag on San Salvador upon his first landfall in the Americas in 1492. Three years later, Spanish colonialists established the first settlement in the archipelago, which served as a terminus for Lucayan Indians enslaved by the Spaniards for shipment to Hispaniola (the island shared by Dominican Republic and Haiti). Within 25 years, the entire Lucayan population of 50,000 was gone, and the Spanish eventually abandoned the settlement.

After Spaniard Juan Ponce de Léon sailed through the archipelago on his way to North America in 1513, other Spanish galleons, laden with treasure from the empires of Central and South America, passed through the reef-encrusted Bahamas bound for Spain. Many foundered, and the waters of the archipelago were littered with wrecks. Tales of treasure lured pirates, and they swarmed the Bahamian islands, using them as hideaways and bases. For the most part, the islands remained unsettled and unclaimed until over a century later, when King Charles I of England granted them to his attorney general. British-sponsored privateers patrolled the waters in and around the Bahamas, turning the main settlement of Charles Town into Buccaneer Central. After the town was destroyed by a joint French and Spanish fleet in 1703, the pirates proclaimed a 'Privateer's Republic' without laws or government, and Edward Teach - better known as Blackbeard - made himself their magistrate. This lasted until 1714, when Britain signed the Treaty of Utrecht, which outlawed pirates. For the next century, pirates plundered ships of all nations and raided towns and plantations both in the Caribbean and the Carolinas. The crown's appointed governor (himself a former privateer) eventually prevailed, proclaiming, in words that became the nation's motto: Expulsis Piratis - Restituta Commercia ('Pirates Expelled - Commerce Restored'). With the pirates went the islands' main source of income, and those who remained scraped by trapping turtles, farming salt and, most importantly, 'wrecking' or salvaging shipwrecks.

After America's Revolutionary War, English Loyalists began washing up in the Bahamas by the thousands, tripling the population in three years and introducing cotton and slaves. The land proved unsuitable for growing cotton and most of the farms failed within a few years. When the Crown outlawed the slave trade in 1807, the Royal Navy began intercepting ships and depositing freed slaves in the Bahamas. Many Loyalists left after emancipation, often bequeathing their lands to their former slaves, who eked out a living from fishing and subsistence farming. Full equality and political rights, however, proved more elusive, for the post-slavery era was marked by the rule of an elite minority of whites over an under-represented black majority.

For most of the 19th century, the economy muddled along on subsistence agriculture, fishing, wrecking, smuggling and sponging. But the islands' ticket out of poverty began to materialise when a new class of rich Americans began spending money on health-inducing vacations in balmy climes. By the turn of the century, Florida was booming as a tourist destination and the Bahamas caught the spin-off. The trickle became a flood in 1920 when Prohibition in the US resurrected Nassau's proclivity for smuggling overnight. The Bahamas were ideally situated for running illicit liquor into the States aboard speedboats, and the Nassau waterfront soon became a vast rum warehouse. The city poured its profits into construction, and hotels blossomed like tropical flowers. The islands' first casino attracted gamblers and gangsters and a potpourri of rich tourists and thirsty party animals.. The repeal of Prohibition in 1933 sent Nassau into another economic downturn, this time worsened by the Depression.

WWII rekindled the tourist industry by bringing thousands of American GIs to the islands for a bit of rest and relaxation. Wealthy Americans and Canadians seeking a sunny winter retreat began returning to the Bahamas, encouraged by the presence of the islands' new high profile governor and governess, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. The duke gave the islands a new lustre, ensuring that their wealthy acquaintances would pour into Nassau in the post-war years. Their effort coincided with the arrival of the jet age and the Cuban Revolution in 1959, which sent Western travellers in search of a new vacation destination. Concentrating their efforts on Nassau, local leaders expanded the US air base to accommodate international jets, dredged the harbour to lure cruise ships and launched a massive advertising campaign. They also made the country a corporate tax haven, and tourism and finance bloomed together.

The upturn in fortunes coincided with (and perhaps helped spark) the evolution of party politics and festering ethnic tensions, as the white elite reaped vast profits from the development and tourist boom while the black majority remained impoverished. The black-led Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) took power in 1967 under Sir Lynden Pindling, bringing the era of white dominance to an end and paving the way to independence. On 10 July 1973, the islands of the Bahamas officially became a new nation, the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, ending 325 years of British rule. The PLP's attempts at reform led to a real-estate slump that put the kibosh on home building by foreigners and stalled the economy. Meanwhile, the party's leadership was mired in corruption - much of it linked to a burgeoning international drug trade. After a US-assisted crackdown on drug trafficking in the 1980s and the election of a pro-business administration in 1992 (returned in a landslide 1997 election), The Bahamas began turning itself around.

While the thriving tourist industry is occasionally ruffled by hurricanes - such as Hurricanes Dennis and Floyd in 1999, and Hurricanes Frances and Jeanne in 2004 - the country is a relatively wealthy one. It has one of the largest open registry shipping fleets in the world and is a major provider of off-shore financial services. In November 2001 Dame Ivy Dumont became the Bahamas' first woman governor-general, and the following year erstwhile politician Perry Christie's Progressive Liberal Party ended the 10-year rule of the Free National Movement. In 2006, Arthur Dion Hanna took over as governor general. Despite the government's efforts to eradicate the drug trade, drug trafficking remains a very much alive, pumping millions of black market dollars into the economy each year.

You can get sunburned quickly and seriously, even through clouds. Use a strong sunscreen, hat and barrier cream for your nose and lips. Calamine lotion and aloe vera are good for mild sunburn. Protect your eyes with good-quality sunglasses.

This is an itchy rash caused by excessive perspiration trapped under the skin. Prickly heat usually strikes people who have just arrived in a hot climate. Keeping cool, bathing often, drying the skin and using a mild talcum or prickly-heat powder will help. Or splurge on an air-conditioned hotel.

This can be caused by any condition that leads to an excessive loss of body fluids, including heat, fever, diarrhoea, vomiting and strenuous physical activity. Signs of dehydration include nausea and dizziness, headache, dry eyes and mouth, weakness and muscle cramps, passing small quantities of dark urine, and raised temperature. The treatment is to drink lots of fluids: take oral re-hydration salts if available, otherwise any fluid will do.

Caused by heavy and prolonged sweating with inadequate fluid replacement and insufficient time for acclimatisation. Symptoms to look out for are headache, dizziness, nausea, feeling weak and exhausted, only passing small quantities of dark urine and possibly muscle aches or cramps. At this stage your temperature may be normal. Treatment is aimed at cooling down and replacing fluids by resting in a cool environment (fanning and cool water sprays may help) and drinking lots of fluids (water, oral re-hydration salts or diluted fruit juice).

If untreated, heat exhaustion can progress to heat stroke. Signs include confusion, headache, lack of sweating and flushed and red appearance. The skin feels hot to touch and the person's temperature is raised. In addition, they may show lack of coordination, fits and finally coma (unconsciousness). Heat stroke can be rapidly fatal, so you need to take immediate action to lower the person's temperature and to get medical help. Move the person into the shade or a cool environment (get a fan going or use a room with air-con), give them cool water to sip intravenous fluid replacement may be needed once you get medical help, ice packs, sponging or spraying with cold water and fanning will all help; ice packs are most effective if you put them over the groin and under the arms, but wrap them up first.

Sweating liberally, probably washing less than usual and going longer without a change of clothes mean that long-distance walkers risk picking up a fungal infection, which, while an unpleasant irritant, presents no danger. Fungal infections are encouraged by moisture, so wear loose, comfortable clothes, wash when you can and dry yourself thoroughly. Try to expose the infected area to air or sunlight as much as possible (without causing offence) and apply an antifungal cream or powder.

To prevent diarrhoea, avoid tap water unless it has been boiled, filtered, or chemically disinfected (e.g. with iodine tablets); only eat fresh fruits and vegetables if cooked or peeled; be wary of dairy products that might contain unpasteurised milk, and be highly selective when eating food from street vendors. If you develop diarrhoea, be sure to drink plenty of fluids, preferably an oral re-hydration solution containing lots of salt and sugar. A few loose stools don't require treatment but, if you start experiencing more than four or five stools a day, you should start taking an antibiotic (usually a quinolone drug) and an antidiarrhoeal agent (such as loperamide). If diarrhoea is bloody, or persists for more than 72 hours, or is accompanied by fever, shaking chills or severe abdominal pain you should seek medical attention.

This travellers favourite is caused by a parasite, Giardia lamblia, which you acquire by ingesting food or water contaminated by the hardy cysts of the parasite. Giardia can also infect animals, and may be found in streams and other water sources in rural areas, especially on trekking routes. The illness usually appears about a week after you have been exposed to the parasite, but it can appear several weeks after. It may cause a short-lived episode of typical 'travellers diarrhoea', but it can cause persistent diarrhoea. You often notice weight loss with giardiasis, as it can prevent food from being absorbed properly in the upper part of your gut.

Giardiasis can start quite suddenly, with explosive, watery diarrhoea, without blood. More often you get loose, bulky, foul-smelling faeces that are hard to flush away (assuming you have the luxury of flushing, of course), with lots of gas, bloating, stomach gurgling and cramps. You can sometimes get a mild fever and often feel nauseated, with little or no appetite, 'indigestion' (heartburn) and rotten-egg burps. Although all these symptoms commonly occur in giardiasis, note that they are nonspecific symptoms and can occur in other types of diarrhoea too - eg you can't assume you've got giardiasis just because you've got rotten-egg burps.

You should ideally have a laboratory test to diagnose your illness before starting a course of antibiotics, but if you are in a remote area away from medical help, you could take either metronidazole (250mg three times daily for five to 10 days) OR tinidazole (2g single dose -tinidazole is not currently available in the USA).

This infection is caused by a germ that lives in soil and in the faeces of horses and other animals. It enters the body via breaks in the skin, so the best prevention is to clean all wounds promptly and thoroughly with an antiseptic. Use antibiotics if the wound becomes hot or pus-filled, or throbs. The first symptom may be discomfort in swallowing, or stiffening of the jaw and neck; this is followed by painful convulsions of the jaw and whole body. The disease can be fatal, but is preventable with vaccination.

Jellyfish are blob-like, often transparent, sea creatures which can sting with their tentacles. In certain regions, it is important not to swim in jellyfish season. Not all jellyfish stings are fatal but certain species - like the box jellyfish (one of the most venomous creatures in the ocean) - can be deadly. In cases involving deadly jellyfish, patients may need an antivenom injection and possibly mouth-to-mouth or heart massage. If a swimmer is stung by a jellyfish, it is best to remove them from the water, in case of paralysis which can cause them to drown. Tentacles tend to stick to the skin and can be hard to remove; remaining calm and still is important in preventing further stings. The best way to stop the tentacles from stinging is to douse them in vinegar (with 5% acetic acid) unless the jellyfish is of the bluebottle variety. If there's no vinegar handy on the beach, then seawater is the next best option, but avoid alcohol, methylated spirits, petrol or fresh water as these can cause the release of more venom. The tentacles can then be scraped off with a sharp object. Cold packs may help to relieve the pain.

Lasting from May to October, the wet season in the Bahamas contains the hottest months of the year and, as the rainfall is quite low (by Caribbean standards) this low-season is a good time to visit. If you're not partial to hot-and-sticky then try March to April and November to December, when the maximum temperature usually sits just below 30°C (86°F). Occasionally cold North American winds sweep down on the Bahamas during winter and spring.

Dip into Albury's book for a general overview of the Bahamas' history. It traces events up to independence.

Focuses on the islands' political development.

Relates the sad tale of the extermination of the indigenous population by ruthless Spanish conquistadores.

Recounts the islands' slave era.

A famous 17th-century eyewitness account of the sordid carryings-on of the infamous peg-leg and parrot set.

Weigh down your coffee table with this book, which covers the islands' history and contemporary scene.

An excellent profile of the life of a US teacher who becomes a doctor in the Crooked Island District in the 1940s.

Junkanoo, the nation's most famous festival, has been referred to as 'the centerpiece of Bahamian culture'. The event is hosted at various venues around Christmas and New Year, when streets and settlements resound with cowbells, whistles and goatskin goombay drums, drawing in thousands of foreign visitors. Mostly it's a big blow out for the locals. The main festivity begins before sunrise on Bay St in Nassau on 26 December (Boxing Day) and as early as 03:00 on other islands. Throughout the islands locals and tourists party the night away. Nassau also host a mid-year Junkanoo in June.

The Caribbean Muzik Fest is a week-long jam in late May or early June with reggae, soca, junkanoo and dance hall under the same billing, featuring the best of the Caribbean's musical talent. Pomp and ceremony occur quarterly in Rawson Square in downtown Nassau, with the opening of the Supreme Court. It features the Royal Bahamas Police Band.

Public Holidays

January 1 - New Year's Day

Easter Holidays - Good Friday & Easter Monday;

7 weeks after Easter - Whit Monday

First Friday in June - Labour Day

July 10 - Independence Day

First Monday in August - Emancipation Day

October 12 - Discovery Day

December 25 - Christmas Day

December 26 - Boxing Day

The islands offer some of the best snorkelling and scuba diving in the world, with 4023km (2500mi) of ocean wall drop-offs, underwater caverns and blue holes - fathomless water-filled sinkholes that open to submarine caves. Every island is rimmed by coral reefs, and the waters offer exceptional visibility and year-round warm temperatures that make wetsuits unnecessary.

The Bahamas is well served by plane from north America. Its proximity to Florida means relatively inexpensive flights run regularly from Miami, Ft Lauderdale and Orlando, as well as other East Coast gateways like New York, Atlanta, Charlotte, Boston and Washington DC. Bahamasair, the national airline, flies between Miami and Nassau and Freeport; West Palm Beach, Orlando and Fort Lauderdale and Nassau; and West Palm Beach and Marsh Harbour. Air Canada flies between Nassau and Toronto and Montreal. British Airways flies directly between London and Nassau or Freeport. American Airlines, Delta Airlines and Virgin Atlantic connect the UK and The Bahamas via Miami, Orlando and Fort Lauderdale.

From within the Caribbean, Air Jamaica flies four times weekly between Nassau and Montego Bay. Cubana has flights between Havana and Nassau. Travellers pay a 15.00 departure tax when leaving The Bahamas 18.00 from Freeport).

The Bahamas is by far the most popular port-of-call in the Caribbean for cruise ships; they anchor at Nassau and Freeport. The sheltered waters of the 1200km (750mi) archipelago attract scores of yachties each year. There are ports of entry on every island.

The Bahamas has six international airports, but the bulk of flights land at the two major hubs: Nassau International Airport and Freeport International Airport. Some flights also land at Marsh Harbour (Abacos), North Eleuthera and Governor's Harbour (Eleuthera), and George Town (Exumas). Private planes and charters fly throughout the islands. Even on the more remote Out Islands, a taxi usually shows up to meet incoming flights (if not, someone at the airport will radio for a taxi on your behalf).

Nassau exudes a special charm lent by a blend of Old World architecture and contemporary vitality. Modern Nassau is a far cry from the rowdy village that was once full of pirates, prostitutes and ragamuffins. The city is steeped in modern US ways which blend well with the quasi-Caribbean flavour.

Downtown Nassau is a bustling centre of commerce and government, that hums daily to the beat of pinstriped worker bees and starched police officers. The tourist hub extends along the waterfront and along Bay St, one block inland. You can't miss the ever-present cruise ships, and their blue-rinse passengers, who descend on the town in waves.

Long Island is the most scenic in The Bahamas. Atlantic rollers crash against the cliffs on the windward coast while shallow bays indent the western shore. At the northern tip of the island is Cape Santa Maria, where the western shore is one long white-sand beach shelving into turquoise waters.

And the best part is that Long Island is virtually untapped by tourism. Snorkelling is especially good at the reef gardens on the cape's southern end. The island's main base is Stella Maris, the setting for acclaimed scuba diving and sport fishing.

Perched on the edge of the Gulf Stream, just east of Miami, the Biminis are barely 26 sq km (10 sq mi) and flat as a flounder. North Bimini is shaped like an inverted crab's claw while below it lies South Bimini, a chunkier and virtually uninhabited plot of land.

Most everything happens in Alice Town on North Bimini (or simply 'Bimini'), especially in midsummer, when visitors arrive in flocks to fish, relax, sit around drinking beer, and tell big-fish stories. The scene gets a little crazier during spring break, when college students come to whoop it up.

Scuba divers flock to Bimini Road - named for the strange underwater formations resembling paving blocks of a giant aqua-highway - off Paradise Point at the north end of Bimini Bay. The enormous limestone blocks are clearly visible in shallow water, resembling the massive hand-hewn building blocks of the Incas.

Locals on several other islands claim brazenly that Christopher Columbus landed on their pieces of turf. But it is Crooked Island that recent evidence suggests was the explorer's second New World landfall. Not that you would know it from this quiet, beautiful place. The island's irregular shoreline is indented with deep inlets and lined by pretty beaches.

Andros is a rough-edged, wild island, covered with vast swathes of palm savannahs, eerie forests of mahogany, pine and palmettos and huge mangrove wetlands. The primeval forest is so imposing that islanders swear they're inhabited by red-eyed elves called chickcharneys. Andros is not geared for tourism but still attracts divers, birdwatchers and beachbums.

This 743 sq km (287 sq mi) national park protects the world's largest breeding colony of West Indian (roseate) flamingos. Dominating the park is Lake Rosa, a shimmering mirror reflecting the antics of roseate spoonbills, reddish-pink egrets, tricolored Louisiana herons, and about 50,000 hot pink flamingos. Visitors must take the informative ranger-led tour.

This 16-hectare (40-acre) park is Grand Bahama's finest treasure. In the north of the park, trails lead onto a limestone plateau riddled with caves that open to the longest underwater cave system in the world. You can walk along the boardwalks that wind through a mangrove swamp and spill out to the beautiful Gold Rock Beach, fringed by soporific dunes.