Top Sal Rei Outdoor Activities: Your Boa Vista Adventure
If you’re heading to Boa Vista, Cape Verde, Sal Rei is like your launchpad to awesome adventures, very truly, so you might be after ways to experience the area to its fullest. This island, with its beautiful, sweeping beaches and stark desert landscapes, very apparently provides way more than just a pretty backdrop; too it’s almost a real playground for outdoor enthusiasts of just about every stripe, actually, alright. From trying to ride waves to wandering through places untouched by time, the activities around Sal Rei provide a taste of just what this bit of the Atlantic’s all about, anyway. So let’s take a look at some awesome experiences.
1. Beach Hopping and Sun Worship
Boa Vista is perhaps famous for its stunning beaches, yet each offers a bit of a unique vibe, just a little, so you could spend your holiday exploring a bunch of different ones. Praia de Chaves, with its never-ending golden sands is one. Santa Monica Beach, considered by some to be one of the absolute best in the Cape Verdes is another spot you’ll definitely want to check out, actually, and with several smaller bays a short drive outside of Sal Rei, there really are very, very options at your disposal, you know. Remember to bring along sunscreen!
Insider Tip: It can sometimes get pretty windy here, very, very making the calmer mornings and afternoons preferable for simply kicking back and soaking up those rays, naturally, of course.
2. Quad Biking or 4×4 Excursion
Really wanna explore inland? Like your most exhilarating options definitely involve hopping onto a quad bike, or into a 4×4 and making a dash to get off-road, actually, or virtually. Plenty of tour companies operate out of Sal Rei offering trips that cut across the dunes and over to more remote parts, right. This is a great way to see desert landscapes up close. Many tours take you past the shipwreck off the coast; it’s a genuinely unforgettable experience, definitely, so be certain to keep it in mind!
Things to Remember: You’ll absolutely want to bring sunglasses and something to cover your face – it does get quite dusty, alright. Driving is often fully on proper off-road terrain, that requires total attention.
3. Turtle Watching (Seasonal)
Did you know that Boa Vista is just so one of the most key nesting spots for loggerhead sea turtles, really, alright? The nesting season normally runs from around June to September, and there truly are tours which’ll take you to see these wonderful animals in their habitat, just a little, and that will be in a respectful and safe way, right, but that is important. It is a very, very sensitive moment. Please choose a guide, right?
Why It’s Special: Very seemingly being present as a mother turtle lays her eggs on a beach lit only by starlight is incredibly moving, actually, anyway, and it’s an amazing demonstration of nature at work, clearly, right, so there’s so few things quite like it.
4. Water Sports: Windsurfing and Kitesurfing
Thanks to pretty steady trade winds, Boa Vista has really become a sweet spot for windsurfers and kitesurfers, actually, anyway. Numerous schools in Sal Rei are more than prepared to give lessons, very seemingly making it very a good spot to try it, for the very first time, very honestly, but of course there are courses, if you have more expertise at your disposal too. Praia do Estoril is an especially loved location because its unique characteristics will create very unique conditions. Check current weather!
Tip for Beginners: Don’t try going at it alone in conditions too extreme, right; start with professional help from experienced teachers who understand the local waters pretty darn well.
5. Viana Desert Exploration
One of the seriously coolest things you might see near Sal Rei is the Viana Desert – just an area that certainly could have landed straight out of the Sahara! This isn’t the typical sand dune environment but an undulating stretch created by windblown sands that have wandered over from Africa, clearly. Excursions frequently stop in smaller nearby villages like Bofareira where you could catch a little glimpse of island life away from major tourist areas, anyway. You could explore the Viana Desert by renting a quad.
Make sure you know this: Tours happen either by bus or by ATV, but you ought to bring some really warm clothes as after sunset, or when the wind’s coming from the North, it might feel nearly freezing in the desert.