On Sunday the 24th of November we headed off to San Vincente where we moored in the only marina in the country in Mindelo. The next day we spent with boatjobs like cleaning and laundry, and doing some more research on the upcoming trip.
Our new crewmember Elisabeth also arrived and we spent the rest of the day socialising and admiring our new Dinghy!
In the evening we all go to a Jazzbar in town with live music.
We like Mindelo. There are lots of colourful houses in a colonial style and many bars, restaurants and places to hang out.
On Tuesday we leave to sail to Santa Luzia, a small inhabited island near San Vincente. We planned to stay there until Wednesday and then head back to Mindelo to drop off Alex and pick up Anton, our final crewmember for the crossing.
Santa Luzia is very calm and we spend a relaxed morning swimming to the beach and walking around the golden sand near the turquoise water, surrounded by nature and towered over by barren mountains. We then head back to Mindelo which takes us about 5 hours.
Alex is taking the Ferry early on Thursday morning and Anton arrives in the afternoon when we also go for our last big food shop to prepare for the crossing. We started to make a new food list again as we are trying to come up with a system to keep track of what food we have and how much we are consuming.
After a few more days of work on the boat and preparations, we board the ferry to Santo Antao on Saturday, to go on a daytrip and finally go hiking! e arrive by ferry in the main town and take a taxi up towards the mountains.
We visit the green and lush island and really enjoy being on land again and walking through a forest and hearing birds! The taxi drops us off at the highest point of the island, where a small village is situated in the middle of the old volcanic crater and some families live off the produce they grow in this fertile soil.
After crossing through this peaceful little oasis we climb back onto the rim of the crater and are rewarded with spectacular views over a valley that stretches all the way to the seaside. Before us lie jagged mountains, green terraced fields and little bits of cloud stuck in between it all.
We start the descent down the narrow cobblestone path and take many turns until we arrive down in the valley. On the way we come past many waterfalls, through lush forests and blooming sugarcane fields. It is a beautiful and impressive hike and we are looking forward to lunch! Our taxi picks us up again and drives us through the rest of the valley and along the coast back to the ferry terminal, from where we head back to Mindelo.
Back in Mindelo there are again more boatjobs, before we head off on the 2nd of December to explore the final 2 islands on our trip, Fogo and Brava.