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| 1870s stone road leading to Mt. Verde, Sao Vicente Island, Cape Verde |
What does one do with five straight days at sea?
There are so many options that it would be hard to list them
all! It’s wonderful to get up in the
morning and realize we can relax and have a leisurely breakfast as we are not
tearing off for a shore excursion.
Following that, Chuck often heads out to Good Morning Prinsendam,
followed by a lecture or two, either on the ports we are about to visit or to
hear one of the On Location lecturers that have prepared a series of lectures
for guests. Other morning choices are daily book club meetings and HAL Chorale
practice. As for me, I usually spend the
time relaxing and recuperating. It’s too
difficult yet for me to sit in one spot for any length of time. One of the first days on the ship our
tablemate Alice asked us to come down for Team Trivia since her team was
short-handed. So Chuck goes when he can,
and I try to be there regularly – pretty much the only morning event I
participate in at this point.
After lunch there are other events we can do – more
lectures, perhaps a movie, and there’s always Bridge or Mah Jongg, water color
or arts and crafts, knitting and needlework groups, afternoon tea, technology
workshops, on board sports, gambling tournaments, etc. Since we’re traveling east, we have the
disadvantage of losing hours frequently, and this is done at noon so we lose
time during the afternoon. If someone is
bored, it’s his own fault! Often there’s
too much to do!
We were invited to the Captain’s Dinner – the first one they
were holding on this cruise. We were
happy to get that out of the way early in the cruise, and had a pleasant
evening, sharing a table with our next door neighbors, two retired English
professors, and the ship’s, Safety, Environmental, and Health Engineer. This made our third trip to the Pinnacle
Grill (specialty restaurant) within six days.
We had scheduled an evening there with Alice, but we didn’t anticipate
being given a free meal there for an “inconvenience” we endured just after
boarding. And we certainly didn’t expect
the Captain’s Dinner to be on our agenda so early!
I spent most of the five days working to recover from my
typical sinus infection – which I get just about every time I board a ship.
This year it started coming on in San Juan and really hit just as we were
finishing our excursion in St. Maarten!
I was happy to have five days at sea to recuperate without having to
worry about missing ports.
The crossing itself was cool and rocky. The ship did a lot of pitching. All we could think was that we hoped it was
due to the small size of the ship, the speed, and the latitude, which is an
area where the prevailing winds are in the easterly direction. The captain also explained that the shape of
the ship’s hull causes the ship to sort of slap the waves as we sail into them.
We arrived in Cape Verde bright and early on the 25th
– our first port in the Eastern Hemisphere.
When we went out on deck to try and locate the area of the bus pickup,
we saw a whole school of large fish jumping out of the water. They reminded us to some extent of small
dolphins, but their tail fins were vertical so we knew they didn’t belong to
that family. We later found out that
these fish are a type of tuna.
Cape Verde is made up of ten islands, nine of which are
inhabited. The port of Mindelo is on
Ilha de Sao Vicente (St. Vincent Island).
Contrary to the name of the country, Sao Vicente is quite dry. Despite this, about 80% of the population of
Sao Vicente earn their living by farming.
We passed vast barren areas with farmlands nestled in between them. Each farm had what we consider typical
Midwestern-type windmills to help bring water to the surface. Cape Verde Islands were discovered by the
Portuguese which claimed them in 1460 and held the islands until independence
was granted in 1975. Thus the languages
of the islands are Portuguese and a form of Creole. The median age is a young 26 and a large
percentage are still of school age.
After a drive through the port city of Mindelo, we headed up
to Mount Verde on very bumpy one-lane roads.
Our guide explained that stone roads were built by Portugal in
1876. With the small and uncomfortable
bus seats, we were grateful that we only had to do the about half of tour on
this kind of road. We made a photo stop
about 2/3 of the way up the mountain and were able to overlook most of the
island. It was a little too hazy to see
the neighboring islands of St. Antao and St. Lucia.
Two mores stops afforded us lovely views of a few of the
beaches that line the coast of the island.
During our stop at Praia Grande Beach we were given the opportunity to
taste the local liquor. I didn’t even
attempt, thanks to my dislike of straight alcohol, coupled with the medications
I’m on!
The Calhau Valley agricultural region gave us the
opportunity to view the working farms of the island. This area is considered the breadbasket of
Cape Verde.
Cape Verde was originally settled by the Portuguese. While
most of the people speak Creole, Portuguese is the official language. Because the different islands have different
dialects, they often can’t understand each other. Cape Verde got its independence in the 1970s
and is now a multi-party democracy.
Elections are held every five years to decide which party will hold the
power during the next term. The
unemployment rate is about 25%, although the area does not look impoverished.
As I write this I can look out over the green waters of the
harbor and see the sprawling city of Mindelo nestled at the foot of jagged
mountain peaks. Quite an interesting
contrast of sights, and from what we understand, this island will be quite a
contrast to our next port of Praia on Ilha de Santiago, which apparently does a
better job of living up to the name of the country of Cape Verde!
BT
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