Cruise Port 15 – Mindelo, São Vicente, Cape Verde

by Ed · June 12, 2023

Ola!

Today, May 18th, 2023, we are visiting Mindelo on the sleepy island of São Vicente, Cape Verde. This is one island we did not book a ship’s tour – they all go to beach venues – those no longer excite us. Joy is taking a lazy day on the ship. Steve and I will take a walk to see what we can see.

We are already docked when I awake! It’s nice to occasionally have no tour forcing us to wake up at sunrise! We are on a spit of a dock. This is very different!

Looking past the dock I see the entrance to the harbor. There is a strange little island poking up in the middle! The island in the distance is Santa Antão.

Zooming in on the little island I can see a building with a staircase going up to the top! There is no apparent access from this point of view, but on Google Earth I can see the winding path that comes up the left side. This is identified as a national reserve park called Djeu.

While Joy sleeps Steve and I linger over breakfast at the Patio. The entertainment crew sets up the audio system and the singers come out and rehearse a show they plan to perform a few nights from now. They have rehearsals for poolside shows when the ship is in port and most guests have gone ashore! It’s truly more entertaining than the actual show!

After a light lunch Steve and I head out to see how far his wheelchair can make it. While on the docks we are asked to stay in the painted pedestrian lane so we don’t interfere or get hurt by dock operations. It’s a long walk to get off the dock! I look back and see our ship peeking between the other boats at the dock. The mountains in the background are on the far side of the harbor entrance.

Someone had a very whimsical concept for this painting! The mountain you can see in the background looks a lot like the mountain in the previous picture. There are at least three ships in the image – can you see more? Cranes are working around the front of the closest ship. People are represented as a yellow hardhat with a few swooping lines for the bodies, arms and legs! Most interesting is the window of the building is framed as a container being lifted by the crane on the right! Assuming the yellow ball is the Sun, this is a sunset image!

As we approach the entrance to the docks we can see Fortim do Rei – The Fort of the King – on the hillside overlooking the harbor!

This sculpture, Los Martires, is pointing at the entrance to the harbor. The name means The Martyrs and pays homage to the people who gave their lives to win Cape Verde its freedom from Portuguese oppression.

Conservation awareness is strong here! This huge sculpture of a turtle weighed down with trash is on the main road.

We pass a wall painted with an underwater scene – digital sharks!

We continue our walk along Avenue Marginal on the waterfront. I see this statue in the median – this is Manuel D’Novas, a music composer, being honored in bronze on this road! Will we see more?

The harbor is filled with boats of all sizes! We hope to get to the other side – the red roofs are intriguing!

And then, voila! Here is Luis Morais, a composer and musician! I suspect there are more, but I’ll say right now that we don’t get far enough to see any other statues in the road.

We see this fun little jetty poking into the harbor. This is the Mansa Floating Hub and are the red roofs I saw earlier. I chat with a guy here – he tells me this is a place for the sailors to come and catch up on emails and texts and calls. They provide wifi and internet for a small fee.

I take a look back across the harbor. Believe it or not, the bow of Sojourn is visible in the far left end of this photo, behind the second mast. We’ve made it over a mile so far!

Steve deals with pavers and cobblestones this entire journey – not fun in this wheelchair! Bigger front wheels would have helped. Smoother sidewalks would be better!

This wonderful swordfish is nicely framed by the peaks and boats! This is a metal sculpture and the sea air and water are clearly taking their toll – the bottom part of the tail is gone. The Mansa Floating Hub is on the right.

We arrive at the Mindelo Marina!

Our next find is this interesting sculpture in the middle of a traffic circle near the Marina!

Sacadura Cabral and Gago Coutinho, both Navy officers, executed the first aerial crossing of the South Atlantic using an artificial horizon instrument, connecting Portugal to Rio de Janeiro. This sculpture called “The Bird” is in honor of their flight – this island, São Vicente, is one of the stops on their epic journey!

This side of the city’s library. It is adorned with an image of Cesária Évora, known as the Barefoot Diva!

We catch a view of City Hall between buildings on a street paralleling the waterfront road. Steve and I spend 20 minutes trying to find a path his wheelchair can take to get to that road, but it is not possible. Time to head back to the ship!

A few hours later we wave goodbye to Mindelo!

I’m gonna do something different here! We still say “até logo” as we leave our last Portuguese-speaking port.

During the sea days on this cruise we’ve had the opportunity to take watercolor classes. Joy and I have painted numerous subjects over the past month. Enroute to the Canary Islands we get to have another watercolor class and this turtle is the result of my efforts! It has become my favorite of all of my paintings so I want to share it with you!