Mindelo is Cape Verde's music town, and three days covers it. Give the mornings to Praça Nova, the two markets and Laginha beach, give one whole day to the ferry across to Santo Antão, and give the nights to the morna bars on Rua de Lisboa. February carnival is the one date worth planning a trip around.
Cape Verde's second city grew around a drowned volcanic crater the British filled with coal in 1838, and the traffic left a Creole port with Portuguese squares, an English harbour and a Brazilian carnival. Cesária Évora sang here first. Beyond the town the island is wind, dust and empty sand.
Mindelo does its talking here. Paved paths under mature trees, a bandstand at the centre, and the whole town circling it once the heat drops. The CNAD art centre sits on one side and the oldest church in the city is two streets down.
The signs read Rua Libertadores de África and nobody uses the name. This is the strip that fills after ten, when the bars along it open their doors and morna, coladeira and funaná come out of them. Walk it rather than picking one door in advance.
The catch comes off the boats mid-morning and is sold by the women who run the hall, across tiled counters and in very fast Kriolu. Tuna, wahoo and moray, gutted while you wait. It is the least tourist-shaped room in the centre.
The pink governor's palace of the late 1800s, renovated in 1934 and now the People's Palace: part cultural centre, part exhibition hall. It is the building every photograph of Mindelo ends up containing, and the courtyard is worth the ten minutes inside.
The city beach, five minutes on foot from Praça Nova: white sand, water calm enough to swim in, kiosks selling beer behind it. This is where Mindelo swims rather than where it sunbathes, and the port cranes are part of the view.
An hour across the channel puts you under the green ridges of Santo Antão, which is everything São Vicente is not. Boats run morning and afternoon in both directions every day of the week, and the crossing is the only way onto the island.
Built in 1852 to defend Porto Grande and the oldest structure in the city: a square fort thirty metres a side around a central courtyard. The reason to climb up is the view, which takes in the whole bay and Monte Cara opposite.
A restored two-storey colonial market hall: fruit and vegetables on the ground floor, craft stalls on the gallery above. Smaller than it looks from the street and easy in twenty minutes, but the best place in town to buy grogue that is not a souvenir bottle.
A scaled copy of Lisbon's Belém tower, white against the harbour, built as the governor's residence and now holding a small display on the history of the port. Ten minutes of your day, and it sits on the walk between Laginha and the marina anyway.
Porto Grande is a flooded crater, which is why the anchorage is deep and sheltered and why the British built here at all. The marina is where Atlantic crossings stop to reprovision, and the Pont d'Agua restaurants and shops sit at the end of it.
A bookshop that turns into a music room after ten, and the rare one where Mindelo outnumbers the visitors.
Tito Paris's room on the Marginal, near the Torre de Belém, and the name says what gets played.
Ground floor of a house that predates 1870, with art on the walls and small sets most weeks.
The Mindelo institution. Cape Verdean plates, a long-running buffet, and an address everybody knows.
Feijoada and goat stew in a small room that fills with locals as readily as visitors.
Kitchen and bar on Laginha, and the easiest lunch if you are already on the sand.
One room of her dresses, documents and photographs, with her records playing off the walls.
Barracks finished in 1873, an art school since 2008, and better for a student show than a permanent collection.
White dunes against black rock on the north coast, and a wave spot for experienced kitesurfers.
Black sand and volcanic rock on the east coast, beside the fishing village of the same name.
The ridge across the bay whose profile reads as a face, and the outline on every Mindelo postcard.
The island's summit at 744 metres, reachable by road, with the bay and Santo Antão from the top.
Mindelo's oldest church, built in 1862 and seat of the diocese since 2003.
The old residential quarter west of the centre, laid out as the port town outgrew its square.
A working neighbourhood south of the centre, and the walk that shows the city off its postcard.
An hour by ferry, then a mountain road through terraced valleys. A full day, minimum.
A lagoon behind a lava reef on the north coast, and the site of the August music festival.
A fishing village twenty minutes from town, and the island's most reliable kitesurfing wind.
The island marks its 1462 sighting by closing Rua de Lisboa and building a stage on it.
Cape Verde's biggest carnival, modelled on Rio, with parades through the week to Shrove Tuesday.
The midsummer saint's day, and one of the older fixtures on the island's calendar.
Cape Verde's national holiday, kept in Mindelo with concerts and street parties.
A small jazz festival, local and international acts, staged in the city each August.
Cape Verdean and international music on the lagoon beach, on the August full-moon weekend.
The international theatre festival that takes over the city's stages, one of Africa's largest.
The calendar closes with street concerts and a New Year's Eve on the waterfront.
The island's airport, 11 km southwest of the centre. A taxi into town takes 15 to 20 minutes; the aluguer minibus to Praça Estrela costs 120 escudos.
CV Interilhas and Nôs Ferry both run Mindelo to Porto Novo morning and afternoon, daily, in about an hour. Non-resident fares are around 1,500 CVE each way.
Shared minibuses leave when they fill rather than to a timetable, and they are how the island moves between Mindelo, Calhau, Salamansa and São Pedro.
Yellow cabs work the centre and the airport run on agreed prices rather than a meter. Settle the fare before you get in, and expect to pay more after dark.
The national stew of corn, beans and whatever meat or fish is around, simmered slow.
Sugarcane spirit, distilled on Santo Antão and drunk neat.
Yesterday's cachupa fried up with an egg and sausage. The island breakfast.
Gooseneck barnacles prised off the rocks and steamed in seawater. A São Vicente habit.
Sea snail stewed for hours with beans and spice until it finally gives up.
Fish soup built on whatever the morning market landed.
A spiced tuna turnover. The name means the devil is inside.
Grogue softened with condensed milk and lime. Dessert, effectively.
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