So we have now been in the Cape Verde Islands for a few days and are beginning to fell like locals…almost! It is a strange mixture between African and European, but to be honest so far we have seen very little Colonial architecture, and the people seem to
identify as African. Our guide told us that in DNA terms the population are something like 90% African. In the early days when the first settlers from Portugal (1460’s) they found the islands completely virgin, uninhabited and rather inhospitable, any fertile
land being way up in the mountains and very inaccessible, so almost immediately they set off to nearby Africa to get some slave labour to help them. The result almost 500 years later is that almost every inch of mountain side which is not sheer rock has been
terraced. The amount of man-hours involved cant really be imagined.
We have now done two ‘guided tours’, the first of the island where the marina sits Sao Vicente. It is very poor away from the port area, and its agriculture decimated by decades of drought. Everywhere you can see evidence of once prosperous farms now
deserted. In one area still called The Oasis there is a forest of rusty windmills, installed to try to keep farming going by pumping up ground water but the aquifer has none since been pumped dry. None the less the landscape is spectacular and the roads
make those on Madeira look like motorways.
A view of the port from the very top of the island.
The afternoon after the tour we walked up to the local beach and had a longed for swim in the pristine ocean. It is a little bit of a contrast to Whitstable to be honest!
After that we had the official welcoming party down at the Marina pier. The highlight of this was a traditional drum band fronted by a short round conductor armed with a whistle and complex
hand signals, each and every member of the band, about 30 of them, watched the conductor with concentration and incredibly complex changes of rhythm were performed with precision. In the meantime in front of the band three exotic dancers threw themselves
round with absolute abandon, two girls, perhaps dressed (if you can call sequinned bikinis and masks dresses!) as good and evil, or winter and spring, and a man dressed all in black, the witch doctor. The performance lasted at least half an hour, and we were
all spellbound throughout. Amazing!
Yesterday we set off at 0630 for a tour of the next door island Santo Antao. Despite being only 15 miles away by ferry this slightly larger and even more mountainous island manages to capture
more water from the clouds that pass over it and has a completely different atmosphere and in at least some of the valleys there is lush vegetation. The roads even more terrifying, the mountains sheer. Lunch was in a little Restaurant high up in the Ribiera
Grande Paul, and everything we ate had been grown in their own garden. Interesting rather than delicious!
Tomorrow we get back into serious preparations for the Atlantic crossing, but this stop over has been a fabulous experience!
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Tim Corfield
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Corfield Morris Ltd, Fine & Decorative Art Advisors
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phone: 02070383548
Mobile: 07798881383
 
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