Azores

Yesterday was a day at sea and a day to relax.  Last night when we got to the room we had an elephant on our bed.

Today, September 27th we arrived in Ponta Delgada on the island of Sao Miguel which is the largest island of the Azores.

We had scheduled a tour so we met in the theater to wait for our tour.

Here is our ship from our tour bus.

The wall is part of the protective embankment around the island.

This fountain represents all of the islands in the Azores.

This is an old windmill that was still standing on a high hill.

San Miguel is also known as the green island and these pink flowers are known as “girls going to school”

They are a lily type flower.

Our tour is taking us to Sete Cidades which is an extinct volcano crater.  The views are beautiful.

This is a little resort town.

We had to wait for these cows to move from one pasture to another.

One of the main trees on the island is the Norfolk Island Pine which we used to have in our front yard when we lived on North Padre Island.

The fields are divided by bushes like this. 

   

There were still blue flowers left on some of the bushes.

 

We finally arrived at the village of Sete Cidades.  This is the church there.

This is the bandstand like all of the villages have.

This is the city’s crest.

After a short visit to the village we traveled across the bridge where the water is deep blue, reflecting the sky, on one side and bright green, reflecting the lush crater walls.  We couldn’t see much difference in the colors but the lakes were beautiful.

 

On the drive back we went to the tope of the crater and we could see the village and both lakes from this viewpoint.

   

We also caught a glimpse of another crater lake.

This is what was left of an old aqueduct from the 15th century.

From this viewpoint we were able to see both sides of the island which is only 373 square miles.

 

When we arrived back in town we went to the Hotel Azores Atlántico across from the cruise ship for a wine and cheese tasting.  We were able to taste lots of red and wines and a large variety of cheeses.

We chose to walk back to the ship.  This is a view of the port from the walkway with the lighthouse on the jetty.  

When we got back to the port we found America.  They had a Burger King!!  This may be a concession to the USAF base located on this island.

What a nice day ashore.