Before we left the Bijagos, we sailed across the archipelago through narrow channels. The depth sounder was the most important instrument on board and I had to rely entirely on the electronic chart and GPS. I had already realised before that navigation in the Bijagos has its pitfalls.

Sailing with a bpurpose: that’s why I set off from Santa Maria in September 2023 with Blue Alligator towards Guinea-Bissau. Our expedition was to learn more about the plastic waste in the archipelago. At the end, our role turned out to be quite different.

At the beak-shaped bow of the narrow, long boat stands a man with a fiery red headscarf, upright, looking forward like a king or commander heading for a shore he intends to take possession of. He is also wearing an elegant black shirt, which sets him apart from his companions in their washed-out T-shirts. The man’s name is Adelino Da Costa and he is indeed a kind of king, the uncrowned king of the Bijagós.

As the sun rose from behind the haze, it revealed our anchorage, which we had approached in complete darkness the night before. Perhaps half a nautical mile away lay a flat island. It almost seemed to float on the brownish water and somehow not be real. It seemed like something out of a dream.

2 November we left the Cape Verde Islands to sail to the Bijagós. Not only it was a rough trip, there was also Corona on board.

With the trip to Cape Verde, I literally broadened my horizons. I sailed beyond the southernmost end of Europe and arrived in a world that Darwin described as a „completely sterile land“. In between were 156 hours – not quite seven days, but seven nights – of sea, wind, dolphins and sometimes schools of flying fishes that shot over the crests of the waves like silver arrows.