Fogo, Cape Verde Islands

I’ve heard of the Cape Verde Islands before, but I’m not sure when or where.  About the only time it’s mentioned in the U.S. is on the Weather Channel, during the Atlantic hurricane season, because often the storms originate around these islands before heading westward across the ocean. 

I didn’t know Cape Verde is an independent nation, an archipelago of volcanic islands with a population of around half a million.

I didn’t know so many explorers stopped here on their voyages.  Most of the names you read about in the history of Atlantic and world exploration visited here.  That’s because the Canary Current flows south past the Iberian Peninsula to near here, and then you can either continue south along the coast of Africa or you can ride the equatorial currents west.

I didn’t know this was a major port of call for the slave trade, with ships then heading to the Americas.

I didn’t know there was a French doctor who lived on the islands over a hundred years ago, who was practically a one-man population explosion.  Apparently the doctor had a unique practice.  Go to see him with a cold, and if you were a young girl, leave with a baby on the way.  A hundred or so children later, there was suddenly a significant number of blonde, blue-eyed Cape Verdeans.  Today, five generations later, you can still spot the blue-eyed kids.

While Catholicism, and therefore monogamy, is prevalent, it’s still very common for a man to have one wife and many mistresses.  The local guide we spoke with was one of his father’s 38 children, 8 by his mother.  Another guide was one of 24.  While some work on the family farm or business, others get a chance at higher education.  Still others emigrate and work abroad, mostly in New England.  Those who go overseas send back money, clothing and supplies to their families.  Houses are often built is phases, depending on how much money is sent back each year.   Clothing is frequently second hand, so you see a lot of Nike, Reebok, etc.  The largest sources of income in the Cape Verdean economy are foreign aid and money sent from ex-pat’s.

We were on the island of Fogo, the newest of the islands, and still a very active volcano.  The highest point of the older volcano is nearly 3000 meters above sea level. There is a huge caldera, below the peak, that is 8 km across.  The ride from the harbor into the caldera was about an hour and a half mostly over rough cobblestones (laid by slaves) alternating with surprisingly smooth sections of new road.

Passing through villages, what’s most notable is the color of the houses, the small patches of home gardens and laundry drying on clotheslines.  While there were not many people around as we headed up to the caldera, everyone seemed to be outside as we were heading back down late in the afternoon.  People sat on stoops, gathered in groups around cars and motorcycles, and watched from sidewalk bars.  Kids pushed each other, babies were bathed, peoples carried goods on their heads and dogs roamed the streets and rooftops.  Of course there were games of soccer.  It reminded me of a mix between the Caribbean and Africa.

In the caldera itself, there was a mishmash of lava flows, not only ranging in age but types of lava.  We saw deposits of smooth and jagged lava, ash and huge boulders.  You could clearly see the difference between the most recent flows, which were in 1951, 1995 and 2014.  Even though the most recent eruption was only 16 months ago, the village in the caldera is already being rebuilt.  Some new structures were being built on top of old ones, while in a few cases people were painstakingly chipping away at lava encasing their house.  There’s already a new modest hotel in the caldera, built right on top of the 2014 flow.  I guess there’s no time to waste when you don’t know when you’re business is going to next be run over.  The hotel had a tile floor that was still so hot you couldn’t hold your hand against it for very long.  Probably wouldn’t have been comfortable in bare feet either, but at least you don’t have to worry about installing heating for a few years.

With a little fertilizer added, the volcanic ash is very rich for growing certain crops, particularly wine grapes and coffee.  The small winery is already back up and running, so of course we were given an opportunity to taste some.

Now we’re on our last leg at sea.  Three full days, and then we reach Madeira on the morning of the 16th.  Three more days to enjoy the rhythm of the ship.  We have a day and a half of activity planned in Madeira before flying to Hamburg, and then Prague.  These next stops will be wonderful.

But I think if the ship were turning round and sailing all the way back to Ushuaia, I would be tempted to do it.

Moby Dick

I sat this afternoon sharing a cappuccino and having a wonderful conversation with Roddy, our English naturalist who had lived 22 years in South Africa and now lives near Oxford University.  Makes me sound pretty sophisticated, right?  We hadn’t quite solved all of the world’s problem, but it was a fascinating conversation.  I felt privileged to have some exclusive time with him.

In mid-conversation, an announcement came from the bridge that sperm whales had been spotted off the bow. Forgetting the world’s problems, we headed on deck.

In the distance, we could see spouts here and there.  The ship slowly followed.  At one point there were maybe three or four whales visible.  You could see them blow, catch sight of a pectoral fin, and we once saw the flukes rise as a whale dived.

Random fact:  Baleen whales, like the right whale, have two blowholes, so you see two spouts.  Toothed whales have a single blowhole.  So the single spout was part of how we identified these as sperm whales.

The whales would disappear.  The ship would slowly drift.  Then someone would spot a whale blowing off one side of the ship.  The ship would again slowly follow. As we got within about 50 yards, we were down to 2 whales; a mother and calf.  Finally, they dove and we thought we were done.

We lingered a while longer just in case, and the two were spotted again, just lolling on the surface, almost inviting us to creep closer.  So we did.

A few days ago, we were told that hunting sperm whales in the small wooden whaling boats in the 19th century was as close to a fair fight as there was in whaling.  In approaching, I could imagine what it might have been like to be a hunter in those boats.  Chilling….and thrilling.  I was just as happy we were in a ship about 10 times the size of those old boats.

There were times the mother was barely moving and riding so high in the water that it was visible from in front of the blow hole to behind the dorsal fin.  By this time, the whales had allowed us within about 15 yards. They were right off the bow.  I’ve never had anything drive home just how enormous these creatures are.  Finally, with two more flashes of their flukes, the whales went on their way, and we did as well.

I hope I get to continue my conversation with Roddy.

P.S. No photos of the whales, but I got some video.  If I stick to my normal production schedule, it should be available in early 2018.

0 Degrees Latitude

In 1943, Ray Smith crossed the equator for the first time.  He was not quite 21 years old, the U.S. had been in World War II just over a year and he was in the Navy.  His ship was a few hundred miles off the coast of Brazil, near the narrowest part of the Atlantic Ocean.

When you cross the equator by ship for the first time, especially in the Navy, you must undergo a sacred ritual.  You must present yourself before King Neptune and his court, be inspected, submit to a dose of humiliation and be deemed worthy to become a “shellback”.

This is a ritual that is steeped in history.  Charles Darwin described his own initiation in 1832.  He wrote of being held below deck with other with other first-timers, then brought up on deck one at a time, blindfolded, made to kiss a fish, dunked with water and shaved amid general pandemonium.

On the morning of the day we were to cross the equator I was thinking about the rituals, the history and the generational continuity embodied in the tradition.  Seventy-three years after my father first crossed, in almost exactly the same spot but under very different circumstances, I was compelled to participate, both in his honor and in his memory.  And because it sounded like fun.  Technically, I was already a shellback, having crossed in the Galapagos, but there was no ceremony on board on that voyage, so I’m not sure it counted.

So, I went before King Neptune and his lovely wife, was harassed by pirates and magical sea creatures, kissed the fish, and drank the vile drink.  After having some kind of strange merangue concoction massaged into our hair and being hosed off on deck, I and my fellow supplicants were deemed worthy.  Another crop of polliwogs became shellbacks. Perhaps, somehow, my Dad smiled at this.  I don’t know.  At least I know the part of him that lives on in me did.