Vieques National Wildlife Refuge

The Navy left in 2001. What Congress created from those former military lands is now the largest National Wildlife Refuge in the Caribbean — roughly 17,771 acres split between the island's eastern and western ends. The refuge shelters federal endangered species including the Antillean manatee, the brown pelican, and four species of sea turtles, alongside some of the Caribbean's best remaining examples of subtropical dry forest. Some areas remain closed due to unexploded ordnance. The rest is open, undeveloped, and worth the trip.