Cape Verde - Sao Vicente/Santo Antao/Sal

Time for some more island hopping! Nice flights with Cabo Verde Airlines. 

This time we fly to Sao Vicente, the "music island". The main city is Mindelo, the place of the famous Cesaria Evora. There is indeed some "saudade" here. We get told it is mostly because of the relatives who had to emigrate to get a better life. Those staying in the islands are missing them! In Mindelo, there are many bars and restaurants with live music. And in the streets too, there are bands playing, despite the strong wind... Maybe it's because of the strong wind that the Mindelo youths were forming the tightest queue I ever saw to get into a club.

The city itself is quite nice with a few Portuguese-style houses. The influence of the old colony is so strong that the city hosts a replica of the "Torre de Belem", albeit smaller - we are in Cape Verde.

The next island hopping is by boat! A nice and fast ferry takes people over to Santo Antao. The terminal there is very modern, financed by Luxembourg. Small countries's club? The airport there was closed in the 90s due to an accident on the runway (which is now used as a jogging strip).

Santo Antao is the "walker's paradise". The relative remoteness of the island, combined with its wide mountains and its vegetation, makes it an ideal spot for beautiful walks.

Walking through small villages, we can see all the daily activities. There are fields with a wide range of culture, most of them in terrasses. Here and there, we see cows, chicken, pigs, and donkeys.

And there are the not-always-legal distilleries. The sugarcanes go through a whole process to be transformed into grogue, the local rhum. Just the smell of its production is enough to convince of its strength.

The farmers seem to have an easy life compared to the fishermen. They must brave the high waves and the big rocks to return to the harbour with their catch. 

Another beautiful walk took us along the coast to the picturesque village of Fontainhas.

Last but not least, and totally unexpectedly, another island hopping this time to Sal, the "beach island". This is thanks to TAP, most precisely its pilots who went on strike. Result: we got stuck in Cape Verde. TAP decided to move us to the island of Sal, all this for free. Life is tough!!

So there we ended our Cape Verde tour by spending two relaxing days in one of these big "no name" hotels. This could be anywhere in the world, but I take it as a nice complement to the rest of the tour.