The geography of Puerto Rico consists of an archipelago located between the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, east of Hispaniola, west of the Virgin Islands, north of Venezuela, and south of the Puerto Rico Trench, the deepest point in the Atlantic Ocean. It is comprised of the eponymous main island of Puerto Rico, and 142 smaller islands, islets, cays, and atolls, including Vieques, Culebra, Mona, Desecheo, Caja de Muertos, Palominos, and Icacos. As the easternmost and smallest of the Greater Antilles, the main island of Puerto Rico, is about 178 kilometers long and 65 kilometers wide. With a land and internal coastal water area of 9,100 square kilometres, it is the 4th largest island in the Caribbean and 81st largest island in the world.
Transportation in Puerto Rico includes a system of roads, highways, freeways, airports, ports and harbors, and railway systems, serving a population of approximately 4 million year-round. It is funded primarily with both local and federal government funds.
Isla Culebra is an island, town and municipality of Puerto Rico, and together with Vieques, it is geographically part of the Spanish Virgin Islands. It is located approximately 17 miles (27 km) east of the Puerto Rican mainland, 12 miles (19 km) west of St. Thomas and 9 miles (14 km) north of Vieques. Culebra is spread over 5 barrios and Culebra Pueblo (Dewey), the main town and the administrative center of the island. Residents of the island are known as culebrenses. With a population of 1,792 as of the 2020 Census, it is Puerto Rico's least populous municipality.
Fajardo is a town and a municipality part of the San Juan-Caguas-Fajardo Combined Statistical Area in Puerto Rico.
Sandra Zaiter was a Dominican-born Puerto Rican actress, children's television show host, singer, composer and athlete.
The Spanish Virgin Islands, formerly called the Passage Islands, commonly known as the Puerto Rican Virgin Islands, consist of the islands of Vieques and Culebra, located between the main island of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands in the northeastern Caribbean. The islands are administratively part of the archipelago of Puerto Rico, and geographically part of the archipelago of the Virgin Islands. Geologically separated from the Greater Antilles island of Hispaniola by the Mona Passage and Canyon and from the Lesser Antilles island arc by the Anegada Passage, the main island of Puerto Rico, the Spanish Virgin Islands of Vieques and Culebra, the British Virgin Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands except for the southernmost island of Saint Croix, all lie on the same continental shelf platform between the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea.
Buxus vahlii, or Vahl's boxwood, is a rare species of plant in the boxwood family. It is native to Puerto Rico and St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands, where it is known from no more than four populations total. It has probably never been very common, but its distribution has been reduced by deforestation and other human disturbance of its habitat. At the time it was listed as an endangered species of the United States in 1985, it was thought to be endemic to Puerto Rico. Reports that it existed in Jamaica have not been confirmed. A few individuals have been located in St. Croix, some of which are within Sandy Point National Wildlife Refuge.
Palominos Island is a small island located off the coast of the barrio of Cabezas in the municipality of Fajardo to the northeast of the main island of Puerto Rico. It forms part of a small chain of cays, reefs, and islets protected by the La Cordillera Reef Nature Reserve. The island is home to El Conquistador Resort.
Cape San Juan Light is a historic lighthouse located on the northeastern part of the highest point of Cape San Juan in Fajardo, Puerto Rico. The lighthouse was constructed in 1880 and was officially lit on May 2, 1882. The original illuminating apparatus, not changed until after 1898, had an 18-mile (29 km) range and displayed a fixed white light which every three minutes flashed red.
The Battle of Fajardo was an engagement between the armed forces of the United States and Spain that occurred on the night of August 8–9, 1898 near the end of the Puerto Rican Campaign during the Spanish–American War.
The Icacos River, sometimes spelled Hicacos, is a river of Naguabo, Puerto Rico. It is 2.3 miles (3.7 km) long and has received the designation of "Wild and Scenic River" by the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System. This river aids the hydroelectric dam in Naguabo.
The Historical Railway of Puerto Rico — or Ferrocarril Histórico de Puerto Rico in Spanish — was a historic 1,000 mm narrow gauge heritage railroad operating within Puerto Rico, an Insular area of the United States. It was located in Fajardo between 1971 and 1975.
Caja de Muertos Nature Reserve is a nature reserve in southern Puerto Rico consisting of the islands of Caja de Muertos, Cayo Morrillito, Cayo Berbería, and their surrounding reefs and waters in the Caribbean Sea. This nature reserve was founded on January 2, 1980, by the Puerto Rico Planning Board as recommended by the Puerto Rico Department of Natural and Environmental Resources with the purpose of preserving the subtropical dry forest ecosystems found within these islands, some important sea turtle nesting sites, and the marine habitats found on their surrounding reefs and waters.
La Parguera Nature Reserve is a protected area located in the southwestern Puerto Rico, primarily in the municipality of Lajas but also covering cays and islets under the municipal jurisdictions of Guánica and Cabo Rojo. The nature reserve is itself a unit of the Boquerón State Forest and it protects the Bahía Montalva mangrove forest in addition to mangrove bays, salt marshes and lagoons located along the coast of the Parguera barrio of Lajas, including its numerous cays and coral reefs. The reserve is mostly famous for its bioluminescent bay, locally called Bahía Fosforecente,, one of the three of its kind in Puerto Rico and one of the seven year-round places where bioluminescent can be seen in the Caribbean.
