| I left Cabeco das Tarafes and the scant
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| | beach I sat for a little and watched the
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| vegetation of a ribeira, and the road
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| | patterns of fine sand stream over the
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| deteriorated to a dusty track. Now I was
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| | ground.
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| in open upland dominated by Pico Estancia
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| | Beyond, the sea crashed on to the steep
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| on the right. It is not a large mountain
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| | shore. From Curral Velho I drove inland.
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| but in this emptiness I had lost a sense
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| | Walls crossed the dry landscape,
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| of scale and as it shimmered in the heat
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| | impressive monuments to generations of
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| it seamed massive.
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| | Boavistans who have put to good use the
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| All around was dry rock. Once, I stopped
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| | two resources that are not in short
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| and there was no movement except for the
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| | supply here: rock and time. From time to
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| drifting trail of dust thrown out by the
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| | time I passed the ruins of farmhouses and
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| jeep. There was silence except for the
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| | here and there an abandoned well there is
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| droning of the hot wind. The land was an
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| | water, but it is bitter now.
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| endless brown and the skull of a donkey
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| | In places the track threatened to
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| gleamed like a white flower amongst the
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| | disappear altogether beneath thick drifts
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| rocks. At last, after an eternity on the
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| | of dust. Elsewhere, the route was no more
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| plateau of dry bones, the track swung
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| | than a cleared path across boulder
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| towards the coast and soon I was driving
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| | fields. The sun sank and Santo Antonio
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| just above the white sand.
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| | became an outlandish silhouette. I passed
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| Curral Velho is a crumbling village next
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| | a tree blasted into a tortured sculpture
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| to a salt lagoon just behind the shore.
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| | by the prevailing wind - It was the first
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| It is built in warm honey coloured stone,
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| | living thing since the crows, hours
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| a place of stone, built on stone, amongst
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| | before. There were low scrubby bushes and
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| stone. The wind murmured through the
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| | then, at last, an attempt at cultivation.
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| gaping windows. Two of the largest,
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| | The field was more like a fortress than a
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| blackest crows I had ever seen watched me
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| | garden: first there were walls to keep
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| from a broken gable as I picked my way
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| | the goats out and then there was an
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| round the ruins. I found a path over the
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| | embankment around each plant to keep the
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| dunes amongst the twisted roots and
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| | water in.
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| stumps of a fossilised forest. At the
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|
