Fodor's Expert Review Salt Pans

Rising like mountains of snow, Bonaire's salt pans are hard to miss. Harvested once a year, the "ponds" are owned by Cargill, Inc., which has reactivated the 19th-century salt industry with great success (one reason for that success is that the ocean on this part of the island is higher than the land, which makes irrigation a snap). Keep a lookout for the three 30-foot obelisks (white, blue, and red) that were used to guide the trade boats coming to pick up the salt. Look also in the distance across the pans to the abandoned solar saltworks that's now a designated flamingo sanctuary. With the naked eye you might be able to make out a pink-orange haze just on the horizon; with binoculars you will see a sea of bobbing pink bodies. The sanctuary is completely protected, and no entrance is allowed (flamingos are extremely sensitive to disturbances of any kind).