Travelblips

It had been decided the day before that we’d come in alongside at Sao Roque do Pico on the north side of the island as strong, gusty winds were forecast for the south side – and Lajes was a little exposed! I gather we had to zodiac the passengers in there and given the problems we’d had at the Selvagen Islands, that wasn’t desired – plus we’d obtained charts for the harbour from the pilot at Faial…

So the ship fired up engines around 4am and by 6.30am we were crawling in. Hannah announced Pico, the 2300m+ volcano which gives this island its name was looking particularly good in the early morning light so I staggered out and took some pictures as the northern side of the peak bathed in the dusty orange-pink sunrise. Even now, clouds rolled and swirled around it, but it was largely visible. However, the large band of white behind it suggested if we had docked on the south side as originally planned, we would not be seeing Pico right now!

Sao Roque do Pico was a small harbour and we pretty much took up the entire dock there. It had a few paintings from passing ships, but looked to be in pretty sad shape after Faial! But there was one pretty amazing large one which looked like it had 3D potential (which I can never see without taking a picture…).

By 8.30am, those of us going on the tour were on the bus – some people had been to the island before and didn’t want to do the tour. So we began by driving east along the coast, gradually rising higher and higher above the sea. The landscape was lush and green and Fernando gave us some blurb from time to time.

However, soon we entered the inversion layer clouds and mist and vision was drastically reduced to mist shrouded green grassy fields about 50m in visible length and bush-drenched small streams. It was pretty evident (to me) that by knocking down the trees for agriculture, the Azoreans had destabilised the soil and it was all gradually sliding down to the ocean giving the landscape the effect of a very rumpled green blanket.

About half an hour later, we emerged (sort of) from the clouds and commenced our drive along the Azores longest straight road – all 8.5km of it, past Pico itself. Pico, the (2) new cones rose majestically up out of the landscape, now a moderate grey colour, making it look like (and sorry to use this analogy!) a grey breast (that was the effect of the second cone right at the peak of the larger cone…).

The bus stopped at a vantage point and we all got out and took pictures. It was amazing how even in the 15 minutes we were there, the clouds rolled up one side, down the other, around from both sides and then swept off down the hill to the east, north and northwest… It was amazing we could even see it!

Then we were bundled back in the bus and drove a short distance to a pullout and a gated paddock. Here those heavy duty hiking boots worn by some passengers was put to test as we clomped along a dirt trail to a tiny well concealed cave in the ground, overgrown with grass and fern…

…Furna de Frei Matias – a lava tube! Admitedly a small one, and a much larger, more impressive – and adventurous one apparently existed closer to the shoreline, but it was closed until May.

Since I was pretty much on exclusive photo duty today, I stood up above the cave and took some pics of people scrambling in. Despite the excessive amount of people NOT wearing appropriate footwear, most gamely and cautiously went in.

I took my place and went in as well and couldn’t see anything but the light at the end of the tunnel, about 50m away initially. I broke out my feeble little ‘see your keyhole for your key’ light and shone that – realising that some of the people around me needed it more than me.. so I shone it one the ground, it barely giving enough light to even show the ground, but it was enough to prevent some stumbling!

Meanwhile, I took a photo of the cave – brief flash and then I looked at the screen. Huh! It was all misty inside! Just standing there in the very poor light given off at either entrance and by people’s torch’s and it was pretty clear air – take a picture and it was misty!

But the rocks were also interesting – grey-black or red and seemingly eroded into long slimey rivulets by the water dripping down from above.

At the end of this short tube, many people chose to climb up the green grassy mound that occurred where the tube had collapsed to leave a hole in its roof and escape the tunnel. I chose to push a little deeper.

Here the tube was split into two levels – clearly one tube had formed then another up above it! The upper tube was really just a cave – barely going more than 15m into the earth. The lower one was temporarily blocked as someone had taken a tumble… But it was clearly exposed because of a collapse in its roof as well. How many lava tubes lay beneath us that we couldn’t see because the roof hadn’t collapsed?!

I went down the rocky steps – carefully since the bottom two were loose – and entered. Only one other person was in there, about 40m in, shining his torch along the jagged rocks, peering at them. The tunnel sort of merged with the one above so I was able to get a picture of both levels – pretty cool! I got to spend 5 minutes in there before we were hearded back onto the bus….

From there, (I was last out…), we drove to the Madelena wine district on the western end of the island, another UNESCO World Heritage site… one gets the impression these islands managed to get so many UNESCO sites in an effort to get money…. We got to spend about 45 minutes at some wine yard, the first 30 milling around their vast courtyard looking at dragon trees, walking along a promenade into the shallow vine yard and looking at the silent equipment – no labels so didn’t have much clue what most of it was or where it fit in the wine making process….

The thing that makes the vineyards here so different from other parts of the world is the vines grow along the ground in little enclosures built of basalt blocks to protect them from the wind. I believe I read somewhere as well that the basalt walls also create a microclimate allowing more moisture to condense on the plants… Looking at the scrubby vines just beginning to leaf, I didn’t want to think how they harvested them, crawling on the knobbly basaltic ground!

After 30 minutes, we were allowed into a 2 story building called ‘Exhibition’ hall – but there were only about 10 small odd paintings – but more importantly for everyone, a table laid out with bottles of wine, fresh bread, local cheese and jams! Compared to other buffets for some reason, everyone descended on this one like a feeding frenzy!\ and they never let up until we left. I must say though, the cheese was nice – creamy with a pleasant flavour and particularly nice with the fresh bread (not the doughy fresh bread native to the Azores though – that was disgusting!)

After everyone was (I have to presume) partially satiated, we drove around the coast a small distance to goodness knows where where amongst some basalt buildings and a small walkway through an old basalt flow at the coast, there was a tiny shop letting people sample Pico liquers made from all sorts of fruits. I don’t think that poor fellow was as successful at selling his liquer (I only tasted the honey and didn’t manage to more than wet my lips before giving up on it – fire water!) as the wine (the wine had suckered in a lot of people because it was nice – and super cheap at 4-8 Euros’ a bottle. Given their limited production each year, I was surprised it was so cheap….

Everyone returned to the ship for lunch. I was so exhausted, I slept… Then around 2pm, we were bundled back onto the bus – a vastly reduced number – to go and see the whaling museum at Lajes. We were supposed to have seen it this morning but with it being Saturday and all, they didn’t open until 2pm….I guess a lot of people also bailed because they’d just sent the graphic gore (Ok, pictures told the story as the machinery sat quiet) of Faial yesterday….

Lajes turned out to be a small fishing village with the usual white houses and black trim. Some of the eaves were painted brighter colours. It was shrouded in clouds now that we were on the north side (even Pico had had more clouds when we left than earlier this morning) and it was a pretty grey day with a stiff breeze blowing. The harbour was only big enough for yachts and little basalt peaks stuck up out of the water all around the harbour mouth. Yes… it would have been an interesting, bumpy zodiac ride in for the passengers!

The museum turned out to be a modern exhibit with no signs of gore or old factories at all! We walked into the entrance into a bright airy room with white walls dotted with artful photographs of dolphins and whales in dead calm water. The bulk of the room contained artfully arranged glass cabinets on a pale wood floor with examples of scrimshaw in the cabinets. The next room contained lots of extracts from letters or a diary of Franklin D Roosevelt, who had visited the Azores on a newly commissioned American military ship for a few days I guess… Pico’s claim to fame!

I then went to the other side of the museum… replica (original?) of a whaling boat… examples of the tools they used tastefully arranged and lit along the walls… a library with books on the history of the Azores and whaling… All very sterile!

After about 5 minutes, I was back outside, wondering what to do for the next 25 minutes as the town wasn’t very big… So I took some pictures of the old fishing huts now all renovated into café’s and hotels with backpackers sitting in small groups at the tables. I wandered out into the marina… took some pictures, came back… looked into the few souvenir stores.. still uninspiring.. and then waited. Lajes… not a town you can really spend more than a few minutes in – unless going to hike there I guess! Maybe that long lava tube was nearby given the concentration of backpackers here?!

The bus drove back to the ship and we set sail around 3pm. Pico was now wrapped in a shiny white band of lenticular cloud, smoothly rising up and over it, barely a bump to represent where the peak was. But the rest of the north side of the island was in sunshine!

The ship crossed the channel to Sao Jorge, taking an couple of hours. Near the eastern end, we came mildly close as there were several waterfalls tumbling over steep cliffs – but this being the south side of the island (and a long one at that) it was all cloudy and misty and the visibility wasn’t very good. Few birds though….

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