The only boats I had seen
on the move all week were local residential boaters going to the service point
and then back to their moorings. All
changed on Saturday morning – by nine o’clock two hire boats and a private boat
with a family on board had come past us.
It then dawned on us that it must he half term, an occasion we often
forget about now all the children are well past school age.
Karen and I went for a
little cruise on Saturday morning – it was a great feeling not having to dress
up warmly. It was also strange as we
didn’t have Buddy with us; I had dropped him off at the kennels on Friday in
preparation for our holiday.
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Karen getting the first
lock ready
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We pulled in alongside nb
Blue Valentine for a chat with Mandy and Peter and then got underway again.
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Heading through
one of the quaint iron bridges
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On Sunday we were up in
the early hours to get the first of our three flights to the island of Maio,
one of the Cape Verde islands. We had
chosen this destination as it is the island least affected by tourism and also
the greenest (vegetation wise as opposed to ecologically). There are only a couple of dozen villas to
rent in the main town where we are and we are probably the youngest tourists
here, the others seem to be French or German.
As for half term – it had passed me by when I booked the villa and
flights but this is not the place for families to visit so the only children
are locals.
We had a 40 minute
stopover in Lisbon and then flew to Praia the capital of Cape Verde on the island of
Santiago. We had an Airbnb apartment for
the night and spent the evening wandering around the town. At one point we saw a grey headed kingfisher
which seemed very out of place in a garden away from water. We walked out along the harbour wall to visit
the lighthouse.
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The light was powered by a
bank of four batteries which reminded us of being back on the boat with our
battery bank
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On Monday morning we went
back to the airport to catch a flight to Maio.
There are only two flights a week and it had been a bit of a worry
whether we would catch the plane or not.
Since booking the flights we had had three emails changing the flight
times. The original departure time of 10
in the morning ended up being 6.45 although the last notification we got was
for 7.30 so we were glad we got there early.
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The airport terminal on
Maio
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We had booked our villa
through Airbnb from an English guy who spends his time between his houses in
Santander, England and Maio depending on which ones he has rented out.
The island is very poor as
expected and reminded me very much of going to The Gambia thirty years
ago. But everyone seems to be friendly
(not surprising as tourists spend money) and we don’t feel intimidated.
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The beaches are as
deserted as expected with clear turquoise water
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| The town from the beach bar |
We walked away from the
town along the beach and our walking app on our phones showed we walked for 1 ¾
miles before turning back. In that time
we did not see a single person and apparently it’s like that all round the
island.
There is a lot of birdlife
but our bird spotting skills are practically useless so I have sent a few
pictures to birder friends to confirm what we have seen so far.
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Peregrine falcons (I
think) coming in to land on our villa
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| Ruddy turnstones |
Although we live on a boat
I really don’t like swimming, mainly because I can hardly swim; however, I have promised Karen I will swim in the pool
and in the sea as it is so warm.
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Karen enjoying the view
from our pool – the first time we have been in an infinity pool
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