Bermuda - Geography

Geography

Bermuda is a group of low-lying islands located in the Atlantic Ocean, near the western edge of the Sargasso Sea, roughly 580 nautical miles (1070 km, 670 mi) east-southeast of Cape Hatteras on the Outer Banks of North Carolina and roughly 590 nautical miles (1100 km, 690 mi) southeast of Martha's Vineyard. The island lies due east of Fripp Island, South Carolina. It has 103 km (64 mi) of coastline. There are two incorporated municipalities in Bermuda: the City of Hamilton and the Town of St George. Bermuda is divided into nine parishes, in which there are some localities called villages, such as Flatts Village and Somerset Village.

Although usually referred to in the singular, the territory consists of 181 islands, with a total area of 53.3 square kilometres (20.6 sq mi). The largest island is Main Island, sometimes itself called Bermuda. Compiling a list of the islands is often complicated, as many have more than one name (as does the entire archipelago, which has also been known historically as La Garza, Virgineola, and the Isle of Devils. Somers Isles is often rendered "Somers Islands", or mistaken for "Summer Isles"). Despite its small land mass, there has been a tendency for place names to be repeated; there are, for example, two islands named Long Island, three bays named Long Bay (on Somerset, Main, and Cooper's Islands), two Horseshoe Bays (one in Warwick, on the Main Island, the other at Morgan's Point, formerly Tucker's Island), there are two roads through cuttings called Khyber Pass (one in Warwick, the other in St. George's Parish), and St George's Town is located on St George's Island within St George's Parish (each known as St George's), and there is a parish of Hamilton in addition to the City of Hamilton (which is in the parish of Pembroke).

• Bermuda from space

• Topographic map of Bermuda