Ten islands, one Atlantic archipelago.
Which salt crater you can float in. Where the loggerheads come ashore. Whether the Blue Eye is worth the drive. Every tour in Cape Verde, reviewed island by island.
In Cape Verde the island decides the holiday.
Sal and Boa Vista are flat, dry and built for the water. Santiago and São Vicente carry the towns, the markets and the music. Santo Antão and Fogo are the ones you climb. Start where your flight lands.
Sal is a flat brown island with three unrepeatable half-days on it.
Nobody comes to Sal for the scenery. They come to float in the Pedra de Lume salt crater, stand in the Buracona cave when the noon sun turns the water electric blue, and wade knee-deep with lemon sharks at Shark Bay. Most tours stitch all three into one morning.
Three things Cape Verde has and the Canaries do not.
Beaches and boat trips exist all down this coast. A flooded volcanic crater you float in, a cave that lights up from below, and a shallow bay full of lemon sharks belong to these islands.
The Salt Crater
Pedra de Lume is a collapsed crater on Sal that the sea seeps into. Salt was cut here and hauled out by cable car until the 1980s; what is left is brine dense enough to hold you flat on your back without effort. Bring flip-flops, the crust is sharp, and rinse afterwards or you dry white.
- 1All-Inclusive Salt Lake, Blue Eye and Shark Bay Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 2,033 reviews
- 2Blu eye, Salt lake, Lemon Sharks & Palmeira★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 1,003 reviews
- 3Santa Maria, Sal: All inclusive Salt Lake, Blue Eye and Shark Bay★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 311 reviews
The Blue Eye
At Buracona on Sal's north-west coast, a hole in the lava roof lets the midday sun through a submerged tunnel and the pool below glows a hard electric blue. It works for roughly an hour either side of noon and only when the swell is low, which is why every itinerary times its stop rather than promising the light.
- 1All-Inclusive Salt Lake, Blue Eye and Shark Bay Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 2,033 reviews
- 2Santa Maria, Sal: All inclusive Salt Lake, Blue Eye and Shark Bay★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 311 reviews
- 3Blue Eye, Salt Lake, Lemon Sharks, Palmeira★★★★★★★★★★ 4.1 · 248 reviews
Shark Bay
Juvenile lemon sharks nurse in the warm shallows near Palmeira, and you walk out to them in water that rarely passes your waist. They are metre-long and uninterested in people. Guides go at low tide, keep groups small and ask that nobody stands on the seagrass the pups feed over.
- 1All-Inclusive Salt Lake, Blue Eye and Shark Bay Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 2,033 reviews
- 2Blu eye, Salt lake, Lemon Sharks & Palmeira★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 1,003 reviews
- 3Shark Bay Experience from Santa Maria★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 345 reviews
The Cape Verde tours travellers take most.
All Cape Verde reviews →More people book these than anything else in the archipelago, and each one earns its morning for a different reason.
1
Island Experience Tour with a Certified Local Guide
Explore Sal in seven hours with a local guide, salt lakes, lemon sharks, Buracona’s Blue Eye, villages, and useful practical tips.
From · $41
Read our review →
2
All-Inclusive Salt Lake, Blue Eye and Shark Bay Tour
from $53
3
Experience on Sal Island with native and certified guide (including sharks)
from $36
4
Blu eye, Salt lake, Lemon Sharks & Palmeira
from $35
5
Guided Snorkeling and Reef Tour
from $44
6
Complete Excursion and Flight on the Zipline Cape Verde
from $56
7
Horse Riding in Sal Island – Cape Verde
from $60
8
All-Inclusive Half-Day Lounge Catamaran Cruise
from $81
Boa Vista is desert that runs straight into the Atlantic.
Fifty kilometres of empty sand, a rusting freighter half-buried off the north coast, dunes you can sandboard, and one of the biggest loggerhead nesting grounds on earth. The island has more beach than road.
What a day out in Cape Verde actually costs.
Every island day out, cheapest first. Cape Verde costs less on the ground than the flight suggests.
Salt crater mornings, shark bay wades, town walks and turtle nights — the everyday islands.
The full-day island loops with lunch, catamaran afternoons, snorkel trips and dune runs.
Private buggies, chartered boats and the guided days that take a whole island in one go.
- 14h SSV Buggy Island Adventure – 1000cc or 500ccfrom $237
- 22-Hour Buggy Desert Adventurefrom $170
- 32-Hour Buggy 1000cc North Island Adventurefrom $153
Four Cape Verde days that will not wait for your arrival.
Most island days can be arranged from your hotel the evening before. These cannot. They run on nesting seasons, migration windows, licensed guide numbers and tides that do not move for anybody.
- 01Sea Turtle Watching Experience on Sal IslandLoggerheads come ashore from roughly June to October, and beach visits run with licensed guides in capped groups.
- 02Whale Watching Trip with MotoryachtHumpbacks pass the islands in a short spring window, so the boats only sell these trips for part of the year.
- 03Discover Scuba Diving in SalDive centres need your certification card, or a slot on a beginner dive that is limited per boat.
- 04All-Inclusive Half-Day Lounge Catamaran CruiseOne or two catamarans work each bay and the afternoon departures fill first in high season.
Santiago is where Cape Verde stopped being empty.
Cidade Velha was the first European town in the tropics, and its fort still looks down on the ravine that funded it. Up the road Assomada's market fills every Wednesday, Tarrafal keeps the best swimming beach in the country, and Serra Malagueta is green when nowhere else is.
- 1Santiago Island Tour with Tastings and Tarrafal Beachfrom $76
- 2Landscapes, Street Art, and Markets Day Tripfrom $70
- 3Island Tour for Cruise Ship passengersfrom $82
Santo Antão and Fogo are the two you climb.
All mountain days →One is a wall of green ravines you walk down for hours; the other is a live volcano with a village and a vineyard inside the crater. Both take a ferry or a short hop, and both are worth the extra day.
Santo Antão Highlights: Day Trip by Car with Ferry from SV
Read our review →
The Cape Verde wind is a forecast, not a problem.
The north-east trades run hardest from November to May, which is exactly why the kite and windsurf crowd books then. When it is too rough for the boats, the islands move inland: salt pans, craters, markets, murals and a grogue still up a valley.
By island — where your flight lands
Sal165 tours
Boa Vista91 tours
Santiago97 tours
São Vicente72 tours
Santo Antão25 tours
Fogo13 tours- All six islands →
How most first trips string the islands together.
Sal
Boa Vista
Santiago
São VicenteThe newest Cape Verde reviews.
Fresh from the islands →
Hike Monte Verde, Natural Park, São Vicente, 3h +/- (roundtrip)
Read our review →
2. Nature, History of FOGO and relaxation at the natural pool of Salinas
Read our review →
Full-Day Hiking Experience Ponta do Sol – Fontainhas – Cruzinha with Lunch
Read our review →
