Santa Maria Travel Guides (Updated October 2026)

Very professional company and tour guide. Great value for money !

Sal experiences know what they are doing.Three highlights:1. Blue cave : Honestly never expected to see anything I hadn't seen before. The effect of the water and sunlight was stunning. A must see.2. Paddling with Baby lemon sharks was just a one off brilliant experience.3. Salt lake swimming. Unless you are in the dead sea, this was also fantastic. The effect of standing vertical in water is a strange phenomenon.Al round brilliant day. A must if you visit the island

Picked up from hotel on time(ish) but in all reality we could have walked it in 10 mins to tour. Usual safety chat,and a boiler suit fitting.NOT IDEAL for a 30c heat.Also a helmet and goggles which all day really didnt fit over my glasses.The tour is run mostly over dirt tracks,which although the buggies have lights on,you will struggle to see where and what you are following.Various stops along the way.You are given a bottle of water,but that will heat up quick aa basically you are sitting in front of the engine.Watch out for the washboard part.That will shake your fillings out!.All in all,its not a bad trip/4 hours,but lets loose the boiler suits/helmets

Excellent experience. The guides are very kind and speak English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. The tour lasted 4 hours and was full of adrenaline. Anyone can drive, without fear, also because at the head of the group there is always one of the guides who maintains the speed and leads the way. At every stop they asked us if everything was okay and checked our vehicle to make sure everything was in order. Absolutely recommended if you come to Santa Maria.

This was an absolutely amazing way to experience the island of Sal. Travelling in an open-air 4x4 made the day even more exciting, and our guides were incredible—friendly, entertaining and extremely knowledgeable about the island, its history and local culture.We visited so many fascinating places, including Lion Mountain, traditional fishing communities, local villages, the desert and Sal’s dramatic volcanic landscapes. The famous Blue Eye was beautiful, and having the opportunity to swim in the natural waters there was a real highlight.We also stopped to enjoy delicious local food before visiting the lemon shark nursery. Paddling in the shallow water while the sharks calmly swam around us—and even between our legs—was an incredible, once-in-a-lifetime experience.The final visit to the salt flats was the perfect end to the day. Floating effortlessly in the salty water was great fun, relaxing and left our skin feeling wonderfully clean and smooth.The whole tour was well organised, packed with memorable experiences and gave us a brilliant insight into the real Sal. I would highly recommend this full-day tour to anyone visiting Cape Verde. It was easily one of the best experiences of our holiday!

Excellent tour, I recommend it, we got to know the island of Sal, many important points and the originality of each town, the guide is the best!! We were with Jackson, he explained everything in detail, we had a great time!! Don't hesitate to take this tour! Thanks for everything Jackson, you're a star.

Really good 4 hour tour around the whole island of Sal, 95% off-road. Buggies were fast and rugged enough for the terrain, and despite a couple of mechanical issues we all had a great time.

It was a great excursion!! We had doubts about going with a 5-year-old child, but honestly, by taking the family buggy, we had a great time!! They adapt to all driving levels, and we want to highlight the guides Nilson, who gave us all the information and explanations, and Raphael, who with his quad made me (the driver) feel like a little kid!! THANKS A MILLION TO EVERYONE, YOU ARE FANTASTIC!!

Jackson is simply the best guide in all of Cape Verde, he has made the tour an unforgettable experience

The guide Ari was great; he knows everything about the island, is very attentive to all our questions (even when they have nothing to do with the excursion), and gives us plenty of good advice for having the best stay on the island of Sal. The only slightly unfortunate thing is that at each stop on the tour, we only stay for a very short time, but everything is timed to the minute so that we have time to see everything. The stop at Shark Bay, for example, would have deserved more time; we stayed barely 11 minutes in the water.

Very enriching. The Xano Guide is super nice, well-disposed, and helpful. Only, in my opinion, there are stops that needed more time for us to appreciate what is good, for example in Palmeira

1-day excursion around the island with a guide who speaks Spanish, is friendly, and explains Cape Verdean culture to you. Excellent!

The experience was wonderful, but I want to highlight the kindness of our guide Jackson, he was wonderful, how he explained things, the amazing photos he took of us, his friendliness, basically he was the one who made our experience unforgettable, a 10/10.

It was truly a full-day tour. I was exhausted at the end but was very happy to learn many things about Sal Island. The Shark bay was one-of-a-kind and my first.

Fantastic, very nice guides, they speak Italian very well, it was a fantastic experience

Excellent. Couldn’t rate this trip higher. Myself and my daughter had a wonderful day. Nany was brilliant, easy to deal with, super helpful and just a brilliant host and tour guide