Adventures in the Azores-Part I

So for the week of Thanksgiving, I decided to take the week off and visit somewhere different, the Azores! If you've never heard of the Azores, try to think of them as the Hawaii of the Atlantic. They're a set of nine islands in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, formed by volcanic activity. They're an autonomous region of Portugal and the official language is Portuguese. During the lean years, many of the locals move to Canada/America so most people on the island speak perfect english. I will do a 3-part series documenting my time there. For my trip, I visited the largest of the islands, Sao Miguel and stayed in the capital, Ponta Delgada.

Our hotel room had the most amazing view of sunrise in the morning. On a not-so-cloudy day, you can see the most gorgeous sunrises at ~8AM. What a way to start the day :).

Driving is a must if you want to see all the points on the island so I decided to go on a local taxi tour to see the place. The first one covered the north-eastern portion of the islands as well as the village Furnas where they did a traditional Portuguese stew cooked with geothermal heat.

The island is mostly grasslands with really rugged landscapes that made for really nice pictures. The Portuguese settlers cleared most of the island when they settled a few hundred years ago so there are not many endemic plants left.

 One of the stops of the day was at this waterfall, accessible by cars. You can hop around the stones and go up to the top of the waterfall.

There were beautiful hydrangeas in bloom everywhere I went. The most amazing part was that they were different coloured flowers on one bush. I remembered in science class that hydrangeas were one of those plants that respond to the pH of the soil. So depending if its acidic/basic, they will be pink/blue, so it was just amazing to see them have different colours all in one bush. If I had visited earlier, there would be even more flowers in bloom.

waterfalls everywhere

 The weather was very unpredictable though. One minute fog, one minute rain, next minute t-shirt weather.

You can see the cloud starting to move in in this picture.

I just looove all the flowers on the island!

There were also lots of dairy cows everywhere! According to the tourguide, there are more cows than people on the island and they graze all over eating the grass. And I have to say, the milk and fresh cheese was so good! Maybe its the fact that the cows eat grass or they're always moving, but the milk has this yummy smell to it and tastes so sweet. The butter was smooth and sweet. It was all somehow...better and I don't even like milk or dairy! Perhaps this is what organic dairy is like? I gotta try some at home and compare.

cow does not look too friendly :(

There's geothermal activity all over the place and in the village of Furnas, the locals use it to cook a traditional stew.

Check out the bubbles from the spring! Every time I tried to take a video, the wind would shift and blow the steam in my face. You can smell the sulfur everywhere in this area!

I did try the traditional stew but I think the place we went to didn't do it correctly. The food I had was quite dry and there was no broth to go along with it. You can taste the sulfur in the food since it was cooked for 6-7 hours in the geothermal holes. Perhaps one day I'll find another place that cooks it right and try it again.

Our last stop of the day was in Villa Franca do Campo,  a town on the other side of the island, close to where the first Portuguese settlers found it. I really love the look of the red clay roofs and the white walls against the contrast of the lush, green land. The white houses are the tops of green houses where they grow the local pineapples. The rock you see off the coast is also a diving spot.

For dinner that night, we went to Boca de Cena, where the chef is also the waiter ,who is also the host. For a one-man show, he was actually pretty quick. I didn't really bring my camera out for dinner so no pictures guys. They had lots of different fish on the menu that I've never heard of, things like pig fish and daffodils. Overall, everything was really fresh and delicious.

So this ends the first part of my tale, I hope you liked it and I'm glad you made it to the end! For the second part, I'll show you a different side of the island as well as more of the local landscape. Have a good week!