Cape Verde

Cape Verde

Guides, Maps, Navigation / GPS, e-Book Readers

The Cape Verde Islands (short (Cape Verde) are a group of volcanic islands in the Atlantic Ocean.
Since 1975 the area of the islands is the independent island republic of Cape Verde.

The island goroup consits of about 15 islands lyinf about 460 kilometers off the West Coast of Africa on the African Plate. Today nine of the islands are inhabited. The islands are named Boa Vista, Ilhéu Branco, Ilhéu Raso, Sal, Santa Luzia, Santo Antão, São Nicolau, São Vicente, Maio, Santiago, Fogo, Brava, and Ilhéus do Rombo.

The islands in the northwest are younger than the others and characterized by hih mountains, with the highest elevation of Pico de Fogo, 2'829 meters above sea level. The islands in the south are far older, and with the exception of a few rocky elevations far more eroded than the other ones.
Some of the islands, e.g Sal, Boavista, and Maio have sandy beaches. The coasts of the non-inhabited islands Ilhéu Raso, and Ilhéu Branco fall off as some very steep cliffs to the sea.

The islands were discovered in 1445 by Portuguese sailors. Under the colinial rule of the Poruguese, the islandd group had to suffer long and often. She has finally freed after a lenthy battle. The last and continues to this day era ofthe cape Verdean history is characterized by the development of their own consciousness and the path to independence, and to an independet state.

Today the Cape Verde islands have probably the most democratic structures in Africa.