- Africa, Cape Verde, History, Independent travel, Outdoor Activities, Photography, Travel Blog, Walking, Wildlife
Hikes And Histories: More Of Tarrafal
It’s a few minutes before 9am and our guide Seeto is already waiting in the square, chatting and joking with friends. He meets us with the warmest of smiles but is continually interrupted by greetings, handshakes and fist pumps – you get the distinct feeling that everybody knows everyone else in Tarrafal. Seeto introduces us to our companions on today’s expedition, Alejo and Gabriella, on holiday here from near Albacete in Spain. Today’s hike is a downhill challenge, we will be starting high up in the mountains of Serra Malagueta and dropping way, way down to arrive at the natural lake in the bottom of the canyon some three hours…
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Exploring Santiago: Northwards To Tarrafal
Language is interesting here: the tongue spoken by Cape Verdeans is known as Krioli, but due to the variations between the different versions spoken on each of the islands, there is not really an accepted definitive strain, either written or spoken. It certainly sounds more than a little unfamiliar to us, and even the Portuguese spoken here is uncharacteristically choppy to our ears. Fortunately, a degree of English is understood and, with the majority of the population being of Senegalese descent, French is pretty widespread. I think you could say we’re talking Babel most of the time. Makes a change from Drivel, I suppose. Monday morning we collect our nicely…
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One Man’s Passion: Rua d’Arte, Praia
Before we move on from Praia, we take another wander through its ripped backsides with an offbeat destination in mind: Rua d’Arte. Local artist Tutu Sousa, who honed his skills at Senegalese artistic workshops, later returned to Cape Verde and converted his childhood home into a studio and gallery. Augmenting his paintings by transforming the exterior of the house into a canvas, Tutu soon began persuading neighbours to allow expansion of the works until eventually the whole neighbourhood has become an open air gallery. Here’s some examples of how it looks today….
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From Boa Vista To Santiago: A Praia Arrangement
There’s an endearing simplicity about the names of places on the Cape Verde islands, a simplicity which somehow reflects the unhurried, uncomplicated way of life here. The island with salt pans is called, simply, Salt; the island with hills is called Good View and a town with a sandy shore is named Beach. Perhaps even more amusing, the two islands with active volcanoes are named Fire and Angry. In the native tongue, these five are, respectively, Sal, Boa Vista, Praia, Fogo and Brava: translated into English they sound hilariously basic. You can’t get much more straightforward than names like those! Thursday morning sees the hazy cloud lift and the humidity…
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Cape Verde: Island Life Begins On Boa Vista
It looks a little strange from the air, rolling dunes topped with tufted grasses leading to desert-like landscapes where angular outcrops stand above dry, waterless canyons, dunes which form the hinterland to miles of empty golden beach. There’s not a single building to be seen until just before the wheels of the aeroplane touch down on the tarmac – and even then, it’s an airport terminal which looks more like a sand castle than a transport hub. The island of Boa Vista fights two perpetual battles with nature. One, Sahara sand from continental Africa blows constantly across the island, shifting dunes from east to west and regularly forming damaging sand…
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Next Up: Cape Verde Islands
It’s time to load those backpacks again and head out of the rain which continues to douse England. This trip will be a short one by our standards, just a three week tour to see some of the Cape Verde Islands and witness for ourselves the exotic sounding mix of African and Portuguese cultures. We’re off on Monday (20th), flying out to the island of Boa Vista via Lisbon. Moving between the islands is not straightforward with conflicting on line information about both ferries and flights. As a result we haven’t yet finalised all of our plans and will see what we can do once we get to the second…
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Chasing Rainbows
“Customer Service, how can I help you?” “Oh hello, I wonder if you can. We have an existing booking with connecting flights in Lisbon, but we’re a little bit worried about the short connection time at Lisbon Airport. Is it possible to change just the first flight, the one from Heathrow to Lisbon?” He asks for our booking reference, then goes quiet. Canned music messes with my ears for a while and then he’s back. “I am just checking your flights, you should be OK. The connecting flight will be OK”. “Yes but we’re worried. If we miss that second flight, there isn’t another one to that destination for three…
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Storm Ciarán & Friends
By Tuesday the TV news is full of it. Never mind the wars raging in both Europe and the Middle East, there is, it seems, a storm heading towards Britain which is akin to the four horsemen of the apocalypse powering across the Atlantic to wreak devastation on our forlorn shores. Storm Ciarán, somebody somewhere has decided. With Ciarán due to enter the fray Wednesday night into Thursday, we bring our plans forward by 24 hours and make the 350-mile 6-hour drive to Cornwall ahead of those “essential travel only” messages which will no doubt soon boom across the nation. We hole up, batten down, listen to the wind as…
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Buried Ships & Blessed Fish
There I was, all poised to do a post about how miserable it is to return to England, heading home from Heathrow through the rain, checking the dates of the next rail strikes, reading depressing news items, waking up to dull grey skies and drizzle, when from nowhere England unexpectedly throws open its arms and says, welcome home you guys….this is what’s great about where you live… The history of Sutton Hoo is so rich that they made a film about it, but really, the absorbing part of the story is all condensed into the last 85 years or so. Edith Pretty and her son, recently bereaved of husband and…
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The Lefkosa Half Of Nicosia
A small sign saying “Pacific Car Rental return point” is all there is to guide us at Ercan/Lefkosa airport, and with no office presence, it’s soon clear that we have to phone Pacific for them to come and collect the car. “I have no drivers just now”, she says when we call, “send me photographs of the car and leave the key under the driver’s mat, we will pick up the car later”. This means that we leave an unmanned rental car parked on double yellow lines immediately outside the airport terminal where it will probably stay untouched for at least a couple of hours – just imagine the consequences…
