First things first, Cape Verde is AMAZING. It is far and away one of the most beautiful places I have ever been, and a welcome change from Dakar. Although I've grown attached Dakar, it was lovely to spend a week somewhere much cleaner, greener, and more lowkey than my host city. It is hard to believe that the seemingly lush island was uninhabited until the 1400s (thanks for the history lesson, Grace!) when the island was used for trading of goods - and slaves. The majority of the plants on Cape Verde were actually not native to the area which is even more difficult to believe since the palm, banana and papaya trees seem so natural for the area. Cape Verde is a former Portugeuse colony, so while they are not far apart, Cape Verde and Senegal are wildly different in terms of language, culture, and people.
We arrived on Saturday evening after a surprisingly pleasant trip on Senegal Airlines. After our earlier cancellation fiasco and our experience with the other refined forms of Senegalese owned transportation (car rapide, anyone?), we were shocked at how nice it was while on board. On an hour and a half trip from Dakar to Praia, we received a beverage and sandwich and muffin, something we Americans regarded with a little too much enthusiasm. When we landed in Praia, on the island of Santiago, shortly before dusk, we began having our first bouts of culture shock. It was disorienting and we continually marveled, a bit suspiciously, of what we were and were not experiencing. The customs official was polite and friendly? We didn't need to ward off countless men with luggage carts or phone cards? We couldn't see through the floor of our taxi? It was a bit unsettling, and by the end of the first day, we made a decision to consciously not make any more comparisons between Cape Verde and Dakar.
Language became a problem really quickly. The prepared young adventurers we are, we completely forgot to bring our guidebook or learn any Portuguese or Creole phrases before we arrived. Whoops. So the two hour drive to Tarrafal must have seemed like an eternity to our cab driver as the four American girls in his car could only interact with him through "hola," awkward hand gestures, and uncomfortable laughter. It was an odd ride, mostly though the dark on winding roads, presumably though the mountains along the coast. But our faithful driver pulled through for us, and we arrived in Tarrafal at a small, beachside hotel called the Baia Verde.
We had arranged all of our hotels ahead of time. Our decision making process was basically comprised of internet searches and random guidebook selections. If it was cheap, it was worth consideration. We either have great intuition, or a lot of luck, or both, because all of our hotels turned out to be great. The Baia Verde is comprised of a series of bungalows situated behind a wall on an amazingly gorgeous beach. We really enjoyed our four days here which consisted of relaxing on the nearly empty white sand beach, swimming in the clear, warm waters, and exploring the tiny, quiet fishing town of Tarrafal.
With the help of our friendly, English speaking tourism official Carlos, we managed to visit, via covered pickup truck, a former concentration camp outside of the town. In this camp, political prisoners from Portugal and the Portuguese African colonies were kept for years.
The next day we resolved to climb the mountains to the lighthouse that we could see from the beach. We had been told by Carlos that the hike was about an hour and a half to the top, and after spending a month in Senegal where people think you have lost your mind if you want to walk five minutes, we figured that that would be a total overestimation. It wasn’t. What started as a stroll through tree-covered path along the coast turned into a scramble up loose rocks and thorny paths littered with cow droppings and the occasional giant cow. As we started up the mountain, we noticed a teenage boy following us. Through a mixture of hand signals and Portuguese/French cognates, our new friend Etu (at least we think that was his name) managed to lead us to the top of the mountain losing two shoes in the process.
On Wednesday, after another delicious Cape Verdean breakfast, we caught one of the many sixteen person vans that constitute public transportation in Cape Verde to return to Praia in order to take the ferry to Fogo. Bags piled on our laps, music blaring, we drove nearly three hours through the tiny towns that dotted the coastline to the capital. We found a taxi that took us to the port where we ate lunch and watched a Portuguese soap opera that could rival even its Wolof counterpart in terms of melodrama. When the ferry arrived, we tried to understand the luggage requirements – a more complicated process when you have no idea what is going on and cannot speak the language – and we finally boarded the ferry. We were shocked by how pleasant it was inside, clean and air-conditioned with comfy, airline style seats and flat screen TVs. We were almost sad that our journey was only three hours long.
Well, we were sad. I guess we should have known when the attendants began handing out Dramamine and plastic bags that our trip may not be as pleasant as we anticipated…
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