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Sunday 20th November 2022
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Another day, another
surprise! We felt certain that we would be disembarking
via Zodiac today, indeed our daily programme stated that,
but when we opened the curtains, we saw this pier, towards
which we were slowly edging. |
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Our overnight voyage
from Fogo had taken us past the important island of Santiago
(on which the country's capital, Praia, is located) towards
the much less well know island of Maio, where we docked
in the little port town of Vila do Maio (also known as Porto
Inglês). |
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After two difficult
attempts at docking on Brava and Fogo over the last couple
of days, today appeared to be a piece of cake for our Captain...
more about that later! |
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The island is fairly
small (24.1km long and 16.3km wide) but we weren't going
to travel far today, concentrating instead on exploring
Vila do Maio in the south-west corner of the island. |
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Despite being tied securely
to the pier, the ship was moving significantly and the gangway
was bouncing up and down. Like some other ports on these
islands, there is no sea wall to provide protection. We
assumed that the regular ferry service probably doesn't
hang about for long between letting passengers off and taking
others on. We were meant to be here for the day. Despite
the obvious motion, we soon heard an announcement saying
that it was time to disembark, so off we went! |
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The awaiting vehicles
seemed to be parked rather close to the edge and we were
asked to board them as quickly as possible and not to hang
about on the pier, so that's what we did. As soon as each
vehicle filled up, it departed. |
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A short
drive away from the port and we were in the little town of Vila
do Maio, from where we set off on foot. |
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There
are a few rather interesting buildings in the town. |
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We could
see our ship from most places in the town. |
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The Church,
on the main square, appears to dominate. |
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It was
Sunday morning and there wasn't much activity in the town. |
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We were
fascinated by a multitude of butterflies in this large bush near
the church. |
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The market
was open, so we had a quick look around. |
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Two of
our guides for the morning. |
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At the end of the visit
to the fort, we boarded the minibuses again and drove to
the beach restaurant (Praia Baxona). |
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We were
treated to a performance of Batuco dancing. |
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Snacks
and grog were served. We held back! |
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These
little insects were everywhere! |
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It was at this time,
with the beach restaurant party still in full swing, that
we decided to walk back to the ship to get some exercise.
Our guides seemed a little concerned, but we assured them
that we would be fine and wouldn't get lost because we would
have the ship and the port in our sights the whole way.
Interestingly, at that moment, we didn't have the ship in
sight! For the first half of the walk, we enjoyed the sense
of freedom and took time to look at everything a bit more
closely. |
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Back in the centre of
town again, we looked towards the beach and immediately
spotted what looked like our ship. |
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Taking a closer look,
yes, it was our ship and it had left the port! Whilst we
assumed (correctly, as it happened) that it had left because
of the swell at the pier, we suddenly felt a little vulnerable.
We realised that re-embarkation was now going to be via
the Zodiacs, but it crossed our minds that the ship might
reposition closer to the beach restaurant, where most people
were, so we didn't know whether to go back there or to walk
on to the port. Being half way between the two, we decided
to go to the port, which was luckily the correct decision. |
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Our walk back to the
port was longer than we had anticipated (3km), the weather
was hotter than expected and we were slightly apprehensive
that we were doing the wrong thing. Fortunately, we arrived
to find others there already and that Zodiac operations
had begun. Even Geoff seemed quite happy to get back to
the ship on one of them. |
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In the
afternoon, we sailed for the island of Santiago and the port of
Praia, arriving in the early evening. |
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Docked
in the port, we were pleased to be invited to Andy's table for dinner. |
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