San Antonio de Palé

The island's only real settlement, a small fishing village of a few hundred people on the northwestern coast. San Antonio de Palé clusters around a small harbour and a colonial-era church dedicated to the island's patron saint. The church, built during the Portuguese period, is the oldest standing structure on Annobon and is still used for services.

Life in the village revolves around fishing — the main livelihood for virtually the entire population. The market near the harbour is the social centre, where the day's catch is sold and news exchanged. Annobonese creole is the language you will hear everywhere; Spanish, the official language of Equatorial Guinea, is understood but rarely used in daily life.

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A story
The Annobonese speak a Portuguese-based creole called Annobonese (or Fa d'Ambô), which developed from the language of enslaved Africans brought to the island by Portuguese colonisers in the 15th and 16th centuries. Despite more than a century of Spanish colonial rule and now membership in a Spanish-speaking state, the language has survived — spoken today by a community of perhaps 5,000 people, making it one of the smallest living creoles in Africa.

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