Cape Verdes, 16/02/2010 - 11:05

So I haven't written anything in a while, mainly because my dawn watch didn't come round again before we reached the Cape Verdes.

And yes, we arrived in the Cape Verdes last Thursday, 11th February, at about 5 p.m. Irish time, seven days and three hours after we left Las Palmas by the time we'd put the anchor down in the port of Palmeira, in the very barren looking island of Sal.

Sal is the North-Eastern most island of the Cape Verdes, and it is quite different to what I expected. Firstly I assumed it would be green, given the archipelago's name. Catherine tells me they are just named after the nearest point on continental Africa, but the place is as dry as a bone, with hardly any vegetation. Another thing is it's my first time in Africa. Despite the Cape Verdes being one of the most advanced and wealthy countries in west Africa it is still quite a startling experience. (That's advanced and wealthy in a third world context). The obvious poor state of the infrastructure, the lack of shops, and the sparsity of available produce in the shops that there are, all go to underline this really is a different world.

The locals are generally ethnic African, although a few are obviously European, then there are a few ex-pats, and of course the tourists. Tourism is very much in its infancy here, thank God, compared to the Canaries and other places we have been. Still, there are plenty of white faces about.

Population is just under half a million, with a similar number of Cape Verdean nationals living abroad.

The local kids might hassle us for 50 escudos (about €0.50) to mind the dinghy when we come ashore, and I have come across the occasional surly attitude, but generally the people are friendly and they respond well to my attempts to speak Portuguese - although all I'm doing is chancing my arm with a few Spanish words.

Bureaucracy here is a pain. We have to check in and out of every port. The norm seems to be that they keep your boat papers until you leave, but so far we've been able to manage on 24 hour passes, so they check us in and out at the same time. there is also a charge of 650 Escudos a time (about €6). It seems all the other boats we have met don't bother with check in, and just go ashore illegally. But I'm having enough anxiety in this strange place, not to be adding to my worries by being illegal. And anyway, they obviously need the money.

So far we have had two stops in Sal, Palmeira to check in, then to Santa Maria in the South of the island. Then we had an overnight sail of 80 miles to Carrical on the island of Sao Nicalau. This is a tiny litte anchorage, with a few local fishing boats, no bigger than rowing boats, and us and four other sail boats squeezed into a tiny cove. The village has no police station, and as we hadn't checked into Sao Nicalau yet it wasn't legal to go ashore. So yesterday, with no wind at all, we motored around to the port of Tarrafal on the West of the island, where we did check in.

We had been promising ourselves a meal out upon reaching the Cape Verdes, but we were finding it difficult to even find a restaurant, much less one of adequate quality. We had lunch in a place in Santa Maria, Sal, but Burger and chips meant a burger with three chips in the burger!! The girl did realise, and brought us a plate of chips afterwards, but despite the friendly service and cheap price, I've had better burgers. Then last night, just after we'd given up looking, we stumbled on a neat little restaurant where they gave us three Pizzas, a bottle of wine, and a couple of beers for 2,400 Escudos (about (€20).

The swell in the anchorage overnight was pretty bad. It wasn't so much the big Atlantic swells that were rolling in to the open anchorage, these were gentle enough, but then they bounced off the steep shore and the ricochet came back and hit us as a short nasty chop.

It kept up like this all night and this morning, so we didn't hang around for long and we are now heading for the capital Mendelo. The winds are light at the moment, if they don't pick up a bit we'll have to run the engine for an hour or two to make sure we arrive before dark.