Days 3 - 8: Cape Verde

We spent most of the rest of our time in Cape Verde inside, working. I made a massive amount of progress with my book translation, ultimately getting through 39,000 words of my first draft over the course of the week.

The weather didn't turn out to be bright and sunny every day. When we woke up on Sunday, the view from the balcony was quite cloudy, and on Monday there was actual rain.

The hotel complex was enormous and it took a good ten minutes from where we were staying to walk down to the hotel beach.

Part of the beach turned out to be a nesting spot for sea turtles, which was rather a surprise, though we didn't see any. I guess it's not the right time of year.

We did find a large statute of a turtle in Santa Maria, so I guess they are a thing here.

We walked into Santa Maria every evening to have dinner once we'd finished working.

We found a selection of restaurants with nice food, including pizza

I was choosing where we ate based on Tripadvisor rankings, so at least one of the places ended up being a bit posh!

The prices were very affordable though, and everywhere ended up accepting either Euros or cards. I'd brought Euros in cash with the aim of changing them into the local currency once we arrived, but I didn't see a single place to change money in the whole town. Most of the restaurant menus displayed prices both in Euros and in the local currency, escudos. We were probably losing out a bit by paying in Euros, but nothing was expensive enough that it really mattered.

When the weather was nice, we went out for a walk at lunchtime too. 

The grounds of the hotel were very green; we saw men watering them every day.

There was everything you could imagine here: not just restaurants and bars, but also beauty salons and clothes shops.

The hotel even seemed to have its own medical facilities.

Once you reached the beach, there were plenty of parasols and sun loungers.

In one direction, a path led alongside a couple of other hotels which were in the same group.

This way, the path came to an end after 10 minutes or so.

In the other direction, it seemed like you could walk indefinitely.

It was nice to see the sea and the sand  

In general, the island was pretty barren, though.

Looking inland from the beach, the view of the interior of the island was like this:

I had a really great week and am so glad I had the opportunity to get so much done. But I don't know whether we'll be adding the island of Sal to the list of places that we absolutely must re-visit one day