The Harbor at Mindelo
07/27/02We came into Mindelo at about 0100 Friday morning. We anchored off a beach that was next to the main harbor, as we didn’t want to try to negotiate the unfamiliar harbor in the dark. We went to sleep, and next morning bright and early, got up and had pancakes for breakfast. It was 0700 local time when we were having breakfast, and already the beach was busy with swimmers (or maybe bathers).
We weighed anchor, with me stationed in the chain locker to make sure the chain falls in a proper pile, then we went around the corner to the main harbor of Mindelo, Porto Grande. As we came in, we saw only a few sail boats anchored. There was a large two-masted British boat that was lined with dive tanks, a French ketch named “Tamata”, another French boat named “Diogene”, a couple of dilapidated catamarans, and 6 sailboats all rafted together, the center two of which had no masts.
We took a cruise around the harbor to check things out. A little, scruffy, dreadlocked guy popped out of one of the sad catamarans and gave us a wave. We moved back, and after we passed by, a couple on a dinghy came out and picked him up. We went around and anchored in a spot near the British boat.
Orlando in front of a local Landmark
We (Eric) decided to deploy the inflatable, because of the long distance to shore. As we were preparing the dinghy on deck, the shaggy gentleman we had seen earlier came up to our boat on his dinghy. He introduced himself as “Orlando” and offered his services to help us find our way around, to clear in with the local authorities and customs, and make sure that nothing was stolen from our dinghy while we’re ashore. We acceded to his offer, and agreed to meet him at the dinghy dock.When we got to the dinghy dock, which was a battered wooden platform outstretched from a crumbling concrete platform, there was Orlando, surrounded by a swarm of small naked kids who were constantly present at the dock and surrounding beach. He helped us tie up the dinghy and get ashore, then he walked with us down to the local Harbor Authority to check in.
I was amazed at the advanced state of decay that everything was in. The sidewalks were all either crumbled concrete or sharp, irregular black stones. When we went inside the office building where the harbor authority was, I couldn’t help but notice the total shabbiness of the surroundings. The steps that we climbed were all chipped on the corners, with exposed pieces of wood. I expected the whole place to collapse at any moment.
Orlando took us up and presented us to the official, and Eric presented him with the ship’s papers and crew list. He was charged a small fee, which he promised to come back and pay after he had exchanged dollars for Escudos. We then took a walk down to the customs officer, whose office was down on the commercial docks. Along the way, we saw a dog lying in the street that couldn’t possibly be alive, but people were walking around it as though it was always there.
We got to the customs office, a small bare room on the dock front, and got our passports stamped, then we went to the Shell Oil office to see if we could arrange to get some diesel fuel. The Shell Oil building was quite different from any other I saw in Mindelo. It was clean and new, and actually had air conditioning inside! Orlando took us in and introduced Eric to the guy in charge. They arranged to us to take the boat around to one of the commercial docks later that afternoon, and they would send a truck to pump the fuel. This was a great relief, as we were expecting to have to run back and forth with jerry cans. Since we needed 130 litres, and we only have two jerry cans, that would be about three trips, which would take all afternoon.
From there, Orlando took us to the bank, where we exchanged some money, then he took us to the Post Office, where we got stamps and postcards. At that time, we asked Orlando to show us a nice place for lunch. He took us to a couple of places that looked very dingy, which we rejected, and finally he took us to a nicer place. The lights weren’t on in the restaurant but there was enough light for us to eat. We agreed to meet Orlando at 1400 for visiting the fuel dock, then he went on his way. The restaurant was quite nice, but it was early and we were the only ones in the place. After 15 minutes, another party came in, and at that time they turned on the lights and air conditioning.
After lunch, we went back to the boat, and I feverishly wrote and addressed 15 post cards before it was time to raise anchor and go to the fuel dock. When 1400 came, we raised the dinghy on deck, weighed anchor and headed towards the fuel dock. Orlando couldn’t be seen anywhere in the harbor, so we went without him. I prepared three fenders to cast over once we got close to the dock. As we approached the dock, which is built for large ships, we saw that there were large black rubber bumpers mounted diagonally along the face of the concrete dock. Eric recommended that we rig one of the fender boards to lay across two of the fenders. In rigging the fender board, I forgot to lower the third fender over, which later turned out to have disastrous consequences.
We approached the dock and tied up successfully, and I saw we were in danger of hitting forward of the fender board. I went to lower the third fender, and as I was fiddling with that, did not notice that the bowsprit was bouncing perilously close to the wall. I went to fend off, but it was too late, and the port side light crashed against the wall, breaking the wooden bracket in two. Thankfully the light fixture itself was not damaged and it was still operating. Eric became quite enraged with us for letting this happen, stressing that these parts are impossible to replace in such places as this, and we really need to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
Once we tied up okay, Orlando showed up at the dock. The fuel truck had not yet arrived, and Eric and Orlando decided to go pay the harbor fee while we were waiting. Eric said we could not start fueling until he returned, as we needed to turn on a valve down below and watch while the tank fills. He advised me to get a clamp from the toolbox in the engine room and see if I could temporarily repair the broken side light bracket. Once I got the bracket back together, a few minutes later a small pickup truck arrived with a small pump trailer behind it. I tried to explain that I couldn’t start pumping until the captain returned.
The truck left the trailer there with an attendant, who proceeded to lift a cover on the dock under which was an opening to the fuel reservoir. He hooked up the pump to the reservoir and then gave me the filler hose. I opened the tank filler on the deck and put the hose in, but would not start pumping, much to the annoyance of the attendant, who didn’t want to waste too much time on a 130 litre (32 gallon) purchase. Finally some other people came by who knew English and Portuguese, and were able to explain my obstinance. At last, Eric and Orlando returned, and we completed the fueling.
Our next step was to go back and anchor in the harbor, then go ashore and take showers at the Club Nautico, and afterwards make phone calls and visit the internet café. The first part of our plan was thwarted when Orlando took us to the Club Nautico and learned that there were no showers available.
Next, I attempted to call Sue on the phone. I called the ATT number and attempted to use my credit card, but was informed that credit cards are not honored. I borrowed Eric’s ATT number to leave a brief message, then went to the internet café. At the internet café I saw that they sold phone cards, so I bought one for 250 Escudos (about $2.50), that was for 50 “units”. I went and put the card in and it showed 50 units on the phone display. When I called Sue, the units immediately started counting down. I barely had a chance to say hello before I got a warning saying that the card is almost done, then it cut me off. I went into the Post Office and bought a 150 unit card for $7.00 and tried again. This time we had a bit better conversation, but were still cut off before we were ready. I decided it would be cheaper to talk on the Iridium phone.
Later on that night, we went in for dinner and one of Orlando’s friends, Manuel, took us to a local restaurant, the “Pica-Pau”, where a lot of yacht people go. It was dark inside when we entered, as there were no other customers there. The owner turned the lights on when we entered. He was very friendly, and pointed to all the notes that had been written from other yachts, taped to the walls. After we ordered, the waitress brought us an appetizer that was a plate of deep fried, head-on sardines with toothpicks in them. I broke the head off of one and tasted it. It was quite spicy, and I was happy to get a glass of the Portuguese wine to wash it down.
After dinner, David took Eric back to the boat in the dinghy, while I stayed ashore and bought Orlando a beer at the Club Nautico. David then came back on the dinghy and joined us there. We talked with Orlando, whose English is not very good, and found out more about him. He has lived on the island all his life, and has two or three daughters and a couple of grandchildren. He has never married, but has been with three women throughout his life. He says that people don’t really get married in Cape Verde.
Orlando then took us to a restaurant/bar where there was live music taking place. This was a very nice establishment (unlike other places we had seen so far), and all the other customers there seemed to be European. Two guys with guitars set up in the corner, and an old man with a hat came and took out a violin. They played some traditional music, and the old fiddle player was having a grand old time, doing little dances and accosting the non-appreciative waitress. Orlando had a couple of beers with us there, then went back to the dinghy. We stayed at the bar until 2200, then went back to the dinghy, as we didn’t feel safe being out too late in this town.
When we went back to the dinghy dock, a French couple had just come in on their dinghy from their small yacht “Diogene”. They were a very nice young couple named Raphael and Delphine. They had been here for eight weeks, waiting for friends to join them from Europe on another boat. They were going out to a music club somewhere, with Orlando tagging along. It turns out that it was Raphael and Delphine’s dinghy that Orlando had borrowed that morning to come to our boat, as he doesn’t have a dinghy of his own.
We went back to the boat and went to sleep. The next morning we did some boat chores. David and I got in the dinghy and went around the boat with a scouring pad and AJAX cleanser to take care of several black marks that had been left on the hull by various black rubber fenders we had encountered on the trip. At the same time Eric made a more permanent repair of the sidelight fixture. We tightened up some shrouds on the starboard side.
We had agreed the day before to meet Orlando at 1000 for him to take us to the produce market. When we got to the dinghy dock we did not see Orlando, but some of his associates (Cesar and Manuel) were there. There was also a guy named Manny, who we had met at the fuel dock the day before. Manny had lived in Providence, Rhode Island for a while, and spoke very good English. He offered to take us to the market, and we took him up on the offer.
We first went to a small storefront fruit market, where we got a couple of things; grapes, oranges, and a melon. Then we went to the main market, which was quite a sight. When we walked through the entrance, there was some guy sitting on the floor holding the entrails of some animal in one hand and a pile of salt in the other hand that he was rubbing into it. It was a most disgusting sight! Once we got past this, it was a lot better. We were able to find the fresh produce we needed; onions, tomatoes, garlic, apples, and the biggest lemons I have ever seen. We then went to a butcher shop where we got some frozen chicken and fresh eggs. We carried all this stuff back to the dinghy, while Manny went off to do something else. Eric gave Manny a couple of dollars for his help. He had also given Orlando 2000 Escudos ($20) the day before for his help over the two days.
Eric and David took the produce back to the boat while I stayed ashore and talked with Orlando and Cesar. They were quite upset that we went off with Manny, and warned me that Manny is untrustworthy, and only came back to Cape Verde from America because of trouble with the law. There would be no other reason why someone would choose to return to Cape Verde. I just nodded my head and listened. Manny hadn’t done anything to indicate that he was trying to take advantage of us.
When Eric and David came back from the boat, we got Orlando to take us to the supermarket for more shopping. Orlando was not quite sober today. Later we found he had been drinking all night with Raphael and Delphine. We went to the supermarket and picked up some more stuff, and took a taxi back to the dinghy dock. After we took the food back to the boat we went back in for lunch, going to a nice place we had passed on the way to the supermarket. This restaurant turned out to be really nice. The weather here was quite hot during the day, as the sun is directly overhead, and I quickly consumed the 1.5 litre bottle of cold Agua Minerale that I ordered. I found during the day that I could not get enough to drink.
The rest of the afternoon we spent at the internet café, then went to the boat to take showers. Eric wasn’t interested in going back to shore, so he took David and I in the dinghy at 1800, and agreed to come back and pick us up at 2100. We went back to the restaurant where we had seen the music the night before, and found they don’t start serving dinner until 1900, so we got beers and sat out on their terrace that overlooks the street from the second floor. After a few minutes, two European women came out and sat at a table. One of them asked me to take their picture. We started talking to them. They are from Spain, visiting the Cape Verdes on vacation. They had been visiting the other islands, and Mindelo was their last stop before returning home. They had seen some nice beach resorts, and they said the capital city, Praia, where Eric had stopped on his last visit to Cape Verde, was in much worse condition than Mindelo. They described it as “awful, awful, awful, awful, awful”. We gave them our web site address and took their picture.
After dinner (we ate too early to hear the live music) we decided to stop at a bar across the street called “Le Café Musique”, for another beer. Amazingly, this bar was really nice inside, more like what I would expect for a Manhattan bar than Mindelo. We were the only people in the bar though, and we couldn’t stay more than thirty minutes as we had to get back to meet Eric at the dinghy dock.
Going to and from the dinghy dock was always an ordeal, as Cesar, or some swarm of kids was always there asking for money. We got in the dinghy with Eric, and we were all in agreement that we would be happy to leave Mindelo behind. That night, there was a big music event going on at some rooftop bar on the waterfront. We could hear the music playing until 5:00 AM!
The next morning we got up and had pancakes, deflated the dinghy, and were weighing anchor at 0900. As we were leaving, Orlando and another guy chased our boat in a Zodiac, making one more attempt to get more money from us. Eric told him to fuck off, and that is the last words we have had with Cape Verde.
After leaving Mindelo, we sailed down the west side of Sao Vicente. It was as barren a land as I have ever seen, nothing but rocky mountains, with no vegetation or any sign of life. We may as well have been looking at a Mars landscape. Finally we got to the southwest point of the island and there was a light house there. I couldn’t figure out how that lighthouse could have been built, as there were no roads that led to it, and it would be impossible to get to it by sea.
The Lighthouse at the end of Sao Vicente
Later on that day, I had finished my watch, and was taking a nap, feeling the waves rocking us to the side, when all of a sudden I felt and heard a “BONK”. It was as if we had hit something. Suddenly Eric cried from the cockpit “We just hit a whale!”. I got up and rushed to the cockpit. I could see a whale head coming to the surface about 100 feet off of port. Eric said when he went into the cockpit after the BONK, he saw the stunned whale right next to the boat, trying to figure out what happened. The whale was about 40 feet long, at least the size of the boat. As we looked out, we could see a whole school of spouts and heads bobbing out of the water. They were too far away to get a good picture, though, so you have to take my word for it. I am hoping to see more wildlife, now that we are entering a less traveled area of the ocean. As I looked out on the water today, several times I saw a hundred or more flying fish come out of the water at once, and take off flying together.
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