Turks and Caicos: Ground Zero in the Beach Chair Wars

Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 02.03.03 | 10:21 PM ET

Vacationers come from all over to relax at the Beaches resort on the Caribbean Sea in Turks and Caicos. If only it were that easy. A zillion chairs dot the beach and pool area for guests to relax in. “But even when the pools are empty and the beach is deserted, there is, paradoxically, no place to sit,” Lisa Belkin writes in a hilarious travel essay in Sunday’s New York Times. “That’s because every one of the chairs is adorned with a book or a towel or a bottle of suntan lotion - anything to give the illusion that the occupant just left and will be back shortly. It’s all a game called Beach Chair Wars, the unofficial activity of resorts and cruise ships and just about any place there is a chair and a body of water.”