The only marina in Cape Verde

This article was also published in issue 155 of Marina World magazine. Click here to read the online version.

There are not many marinas in the world that can claim to be the only facility of their kind in a whole country, but Marina Mindelo on the island of São Vicente in Cape Verde falls into this elusive, exclusive category.

Marina Mindelo is the long-time labour of love for the German partners Kai Brossmann and Lutz Meyer-Scheel, who came to Cape Verde some 20-30 years ago with the vision of developing nautical tourism. Recognising the lack of infrastructure for recreational yachts, they embarked on an ambitious project to create what would become Cape Verde's first and, to this day, only fully equipped marina.

“What I originally wanted to do was instruct people on how to single-handedly cross the Atlantic, I wanted to teach them how to do it,” Kai told me. “But it turned out to not be such a good idea because we couldn’t really give them any proper qualification or certificate.”

Instead, he and his partner decided to charter the couple of yachts they had, but they quickly found out that there was no infrastructure to berth recreational boats anywhere on São Vicente, or even in the whole archipelago of Cape Verde. “There was a port for cargo and fishing vessels, but nothing for yachts whatsoever,” he said.

“It was clear we needed some sort of infrastructure. A pontoon, some basic yacht supplies, lines and shackles made from stainless steel, and so on. I figured that there was nothing here, so I might as well stay and do it!”

‍“Why don’t you build a proper marina?”

Kai Brossmann managed to get authorisation from the government in 2003 to build a small 60-metre pontoon together with his partner, and after a couple years they explored extending it as it had filled up pretty quickly. 

“So I went back to the ministry with a request to expand it,” Kai told me, “and they replied by suggesting I build a proper marina. That was in 2006.”

The agreement to build a proper marina was signed with the Cape Verdean government in 2007 and they ordered all the floating infrastructure from a Spanish company that no longer existed in 2026. All the pontoons’ constituent parts were shipped from Spain, while the final assembly, blocks and access works were done by a local construction company. After a few final finishing touches, the full marina opened in 2008.

“We have expanded a little bit since then,” said Kai. “We now have six pontoons, which does not make us a huge marina, but there is nothing elsewhere in the whole country. I was convinced that once we have a marina here, all the other islands would come and say that they want one too. It’s a nice business, people come and spend their money, but that was 20 years ago and strangely nothing else has really happened. We are still the only marina in Cape Verde.”

‍Trans-Atlantic cruising

When you consider Cape Verde’s position on a map, it becomes even more surprising that Marina Mindelo has remained the only facility of its kind in the entire country for almost 20 years. It is more or less exactly halfway between the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea at the Strait of Gibraltar and the Brazilian cities of Fortaleza and Natal - although yacht visitation to these places is inhibited by a lack of facilities. The state of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil’s yachting hub, is still over 2000km to the south.

Nevertheless, Cape Verde would also represent a refreshing and adventurous detour in a trans-Atlantic cruising itinerary between the Caribbean and the Mediterranean, or at least as a good place for an excursion from Spain’s Canary Islands, which are around 1500km to the northeast up the coast of West Africa.

And, for those yachts perhaps heading towards Cape Town in South Africa, and maybe even rounding the Cape of Good Hope on their way to the Indian Ocean and beyond, Cape Verde is also an ideal stop-over destination as it lies slap-bang on the most direct route from western Europe to the South Atlantic.

Marina Mindelo does welcome the odd yacht heading to and from South Africa, although they often welcome more yachts coming from there than going there. “Those that do berth at Marina Mindelo often do so after heading to Cape Town for their boatyards. They send their yachts or catamarans down there for a service, and then make a short stop on their way back to Europe,” Kai said. 

Nevertheless, these long-distance journeys to the Mother City via Marina Mindelo are still rare. “You could count them on two hands,” he concluded.

‍Yacht racing

However, what Marina Mindelo might lose out on in trans-Atlantic superyacht cruising it certainly makes up for with a rich and vibrant calendar of races and events. The marina hosted their first race one year before formally opening, a French race called Rallye des îles du soleil that heads from Fuerteventura to Guadeloupe via São Vicente. 

With a history stretching back as far as 1990 and having been disrupted by the pandemic, the race has been held every year since 2022 and will once again pass by Marina Mindelo in November 2026.

Similarly, the ARC+ race from Gran Canaria to Grenada also uses Marina Mindelo as a convenient stop-over, with participants able to enjoy Cape Verde for a few days before embarking on the two-week trip across the Atlantic. Other well-known races to pass by the island include the Globe40 round-the-world race and the exclusive Viking Explorers rally, which is next due to take place in January 2027.

But this successful focus on races was never really the plan, said Kai. “We didn’t have any of this in mind when we built the marina, it was just that Cape Verde is pretty much the best starting point to go to the Caribbean. Races came afterwards once the word started spreading, and this is how we have become pretty busy at peak times of the year.”

‍Enormous economic impact

Jackie Gomes has been at Marina Mindelo since August 2008, first starting out in the office but now working as the marina director. She tells me that they have a capacity of 140 boats up to 50 metres long, and although they might only host three or four superyachts in the low season with plenty of occupancy left over in the small berths, the marina is reliably at full occupancy during the high season, welcoming the maximum possible number of eight superyachts at any given time. I was assured that if boats want to berth at Marina Mindelo in October, November or December, they should better book ahead otherwise they might have to rely on luck to get a space.

For what is only a small marina, in a small town, on a small island, in a small country, Kai, Jackie and the administrative director Ivanice Estevão are keen to highlight the enormous economic impact that Marina Mindelo has.

“It’s very positive, it’s huge,” they reply. “The whole island is very happy when we have a race here,” Jackie continues. “All the shops, mini-markets, laundrettes, they all come to ask us when the next race is coming. In fact it’s not only the races but the whole high season as well. It is very positive for the economy here.”

Kai added that although larger cruise ships also come to the island, these tourists don’t necessarily spend much or make a particularly significant economic contribution. “They walk around, they look and off they go! But our clients spend a lot of money in restaurants, in supermarkets, in yacht service, you name it,” he said.

‍Expansion plans, bureaucratic hurdles

Given the shortage of available berths in the high season, it is no surprise that Marina Mindelo is looking to expand “a little bit more”, according to Kai. “We have more and more requests each year and the seasons are getting longer, but we have the same issues that many others in this industry face, which is bureaucracy.”

Any expansion plans would have to be run through the Cape Verdean government, with commissions, licences and permits granted or extended. Naturally, this is extremely difficult to achieve despite the well-known and much-celebrated impact that the marina has on the local economy. 

“We are willing to invest a bit more, and getting past this bureaucracy would give us more reasons and security to make those investments,” Kai assured me. “We need to expand, that much is clear. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when. But until those permits and licences come through, we will continue on as we are.”

Kai adds they also have the advantage of being in an old volcano crater, protecting the marina from all sides. “Even if we have a hurricane, which is very rare, we are well protected. With the other islands, you would need to build out a huge breakwater, which would make any investment much harder,” he adds. 

“Sometimes, if there is a lot of wind, we can get a large swell with a wavelength of around 150 metres, and because of this we couldn’t build the marina on piles. We have floating docks but they are fixed with anchors and chains. If you have the boats moving back and forth because of the swell but the docks are fixed in place with piles, then the boats would smash into the pontoons. This way the boats can be safe and the marina is safe, and this is how it’s been for some 20 years now.”

‍Will competition come?

But how long will Marina Mindelo remain the only marina in the entire country? Kai, Jackie and Ivanice seem to think that their position is safe, at least for the foreseeable future.

“I think it’s the bureaucracy,” Kai said. “A lot of people have tried it, I’ve seen quite a few people want to invest here, but they all ended up pulling out after a couple of years because the bureaucracy made it too difficult to continue.”

“It’s also the place, the town of Mindelo is quite unique,” Jackie and Ivanice conclude. “When you build a marina it has to be in the centre of town, close to where people live their daily lives. There are many other places where you could build marinas on the other islands, but they are quite far outside the main towns and cities. The place we occupy here in Mindelo, right in the town centre, is perfect.”