A town on the edge of an active volcano — and wine grown in the crater
São Filipe is the main town on Fogo Island, which is dominated by the Pico do Fogo — an active stratovolcano rising to 2,829 metres, the highest peak in Cape Verde and one of the most active volcanoes in the Atlantic. The last major eruption was in 2014–2015, when lava destroyed much of the village of Chã das Caldeiras inside the caldera. The town itself sits on the lower slopes, looking out over the Atlantic with a row of colonial sobrados (2-storey mansions with overhanging balconies) along the waterfront. Inside the volcano's caldera, a community of Fogo wine producers make wine from vines…
Fogo Island's Portuguese colonisation began in 1460; São Filipe was founded as the administrative centre in the 17th century and remains the only substantial town on the island. The island's slave-plantation economy produced coffee and sugar before the abolition of the Portuguese slave trade. The Chã das Caldeiras community inside the volcanic caldera was established by a Portuguese nobleman in the 19th century — his descendants (the Montrond family) still live in the caldera and produce the famous Fogo wine. The 1995 eruption destroyed part of the caldera village; the 2014–2015 eruption was…