Climate
The climate of the Cape Verde archipelago is arid and semi-arid, as it is strongly influenced by the trade winds that blow from the northeast. Although it is arid, there is a constant breeze, which decreases at the end of the day, and makes the tropical temperatures more pleasant. The temperature ranges between 18°C and 32°C, and the average air temperatures are between 24°C and 29°C.
The Harmattan, or lestada, blows from the East-Northeast between December and February, sometimes making the atmosphere less clear, as it transports a fine white dust (bruma seca) from the Sahel.
The scarce rains that fall on Cape Verde come from the tropical monsoon, which blows occasionally from the South between July and October, watering the dry islands and blessing the seeds that the inhabitants of the agricultural islands have sown around this period. The people of the islands enjoy the rains as a liberating magic, in the face of frequent droughts in their history, which have often had dramatic consequences.
The great writer, Manuel Lopes, born on the island of S. Nicolau, left a stark testimony to the drama experienced by the inhabitants of his island in the most difficult periods of lestada, in his novel, which has since been made into a film, Os Flagelados do Vento Leste (Beaten by the East Wind).
Gabriel Mariano, who wrote some of the "mornas" that are most representative of life in Cape Verde, used a sharp phrase to express the other dramatic face of the drought, the floods: "...si ca tem tchuva, morrê di sêde… si tchuva vem, morrê fogado…" (...if there is no rain, you die of thirst... if the rain comes, you drown...) Indeed the torrential rains from the monsoons in the months mentioned above, between July and October, as a result of the confluence of the trade winds, which blow in opposite directions, moving south, the dried out land is flooded with water, often causing floods that sweep the hillsides and valleys, dragging earth and loose stones, and can destroy crops or even buildings near the stream banks.
The climate of the Cape Verde archipelago is arid and semi-arid, as it is strongly influenced by the trade winds that blow from the northeast. Although it is arid, there is a constant breeze, which decreases at the end of the day, and makes the tropical temperatures more pleasant. The temperature ranges between 18°C and 32°C, and the average air temperatures are between 24°C and 29°C.
The Harmattan, or lestada, blows from the East-Northeast between December and February, sometimes making the atmosphere less clear, as it transports a fine white dust (bruma seca) from the Sahel.
The scarce rains that fall on Cape Verde come from the tropical monsoon, which blows occasionally from the South between July and October, watering the dry islands and blessing the seeds that the inhabitants of the agricultural islands have sown around this period. The people of the islands enjoy the rains as a liberating magic, in the face of frequent droughts in their history, which have often had dramatic consequences.
The great writer, Manuel Lopes, born on the island of S. Nicolau, left a stark testimony to the drama experienced by the inhabitants of his island in the most difficult periods of lestada, in his novel, which has since been made into a film, Os Flagelados do Vento Leste (Beaten by the East Wind).
Gabriel Mariano, who wrote some of the "mornas" that are most representative of life in Cape Verde, used a sharp phrase to express the other dramatic face of the drought, the floods: "...si ca tem tchuva, morrê di sêde… si tchuva vem, morrê fogado…" (...if there is no rain, you die of thirst... if the rain comes, you drown...) Indeed the torrential rains from the monsoons in the months mentioned above, between July and October, as a result of the confluence of the trade winds, which blow in opposite directions, moving south, the dried out land is flooded with water, often causing floods that sweep the hillsides and valleys, dragging earth and loose stones, and can destroy crops or even buildings near the stream banks.
