For part of Denver's 10 day paternity leave, we planned a trip to
one of the other islands, Sao Miguel. It is the biggest of the 9 islands in the Azores. We went to the travel agent on base to find out when the ferry was leaving. Lucky for us, we were able to schedule for the last ferry. It was going to be a 6 hour ferry and we could bring our van. We all got 25% off because it was end of peak season and the 2 youngest were only 2 Euro to take the ferry. We had booked the trip about 3 weeks before his leave started.
An hour before we had to be at the pier we got a text in Portuguese. Not being able to read it, we went to the travel agent and had her translate. She told us that it looked like the ferry was definitely leaving Terceira for Sao Miguel, but it won't come back Monday (which it was initially going to do), but MIGHT come back Wednesday. (Because the company went on strike). The travel agent said we could still go if we wanted or we could get a refund. While we were contemplating what to do (seems like a no brainer, but we really wanted to go and the prices were great because of the end of season) the travel agent got an email from the company (the company's name is Atlanticoline) saying that they came to an agreement and would be coming back on Wednesday. So we decided to go and we would just be there a couple extra days. Driving to the ferry, the skies were pretty.
We arrived to the Pier with a little bit of worry that maybe the boat wouldn't come back to Terceira. That wouldn't be a problem, because we could fly, but it would be for our car. We decided to take the plunge and get on the boat and deal with the consequences later (a little bit overzealous indeed). Can you tell where this is going?
Here is the boat we were going to get on.
Happy kids excited to get on the 'big boat'!
Once we entered the ramp, there was no turning back.
There are 2 kinds of boats that go to the other islands. The fast boat and the slow boat :). The fast one takes 3 hours, but it wasn't going anymore to Sao Miguel this season. The slow one takes 6 hours! However, on the fast one you can't go outside and on the slow one you can. Denver and the two older kids took Dramamine, I took Meclizine and the 2 little boys took Benadryl for seasickness. Although each of these meds make you drowsy, only Denver got a nap. Nobody got seasick. It was sunny for most of the boat ride and the waves were small.
Say goodbye to Terceira
Laying on the deck outside.
After awhile it gold cold outside and we went inside. We found a big room with only one other person in it and set up station there.
Colson playing leapster.
Land Ho! If you look closely through the fog, you can see land in the distance.
It was cloudy and rainy going into Sao Miguel. There are a ton of pictures!
Once we saw land, it took another hour and a 1/2 until we finally 'landed'. We were able to get some nice sunset shots.
The Atlantic Ocean. It's gorgeous.
Getting are things together to leave Express Santorini on Atlanticoline.
A picture of the main city, Ponta Delgada, where we stayed. Compared to Terceira, this place is huge and very modern. On our island we have maybe 2 street lights and they are in Angra, about a 20 minute drive. This city had lots more. The roads had more lanes and there were tons more people. Ponta Delgada has a mall with lots of shops and a food court. The city also has a fast food place. We don't have any of these things on our island and I really don't miss them.
This was the biggest hotel room we have ever stayed in. As you can see in the pictures, the room had a bed for everyone.
Our bathroom.
We stayed in this room 4 nights and never felt too crowded.
Our hotel was down this street, in historical Ponta Delgada. Interesting fact: our hotel used to be a preschool a long time ago.
We parked at this church and then walked down the street to get to our hotel.
I thought this escalator thing was cool. It's pretty much a moving ramp instead of a moving staircase. People took their shopping carts on it. I had never seen one of these.
So we arrived on the island on Friday night. On Saturday, we headed to Furnas to find the hot springs.
Big roads :)
Yes! There are cows on this island too!
It took us a long time time to drive to Furnas. The island is so much bigger than ours. This was the first 'road trip' we took with each seat in the van filled. Not fun. The kids are just too close together and the noise level was way to high for my patience.
Letting the cows pass us. It was fun to see that this happens here too.
We passed Furnas Lake.
Overlooking the town of Furnas.
We never could find out how to get to that waterfall.
If you look in the middle of this picture below you can see smoke. That is where the sulfur spots are.
We went to a restaurant that served a dish called 'cozhida'. It is basically a taste of different meats and potatoes cooked in some hot springs. We just pushed aside the spinach on top, didn't look too tasty.
The kids got yucky tasting burgers and fries.
The bread, as always, was fantastic.
some of the sulfur spots.
check out that water boiling. Talk about HOT!
The kids didn't like the smell of sulfur :).
The bags you see in the water is the food cooking. This is probably the corn on the cob that a store was selling nearby, but that is generally how our lunch was cooked.
Little puddles of boiling water were all over. They were enclosed by a short stone fence.
The church again, only this time it was sunny.
On Sunday we went to church in Ponta Delgada. The funny thing was we saw the missionaries at the store on Saturday and asked them where the church was. They pointed it out to us because you could see the steeple from the 2nd floor of the store. Our District President lives in Sao Miguel so we were able to see him and talk with him.
After church, we drove to Sete Cidades. (seven cities). It has 2 beautiful sister lakes. In the summer when it's sunny and not so foggy and cloudy, one lake is blue and the other is green.
From this viewpoint, you could see the lakes and their different colors if it weren't so foggy.
I think on nice days the one on the right is the green lake and the one on the left the blue. you can kind of see it.
We spent some time playing by the lake. The kids had a great time finding fish and crawdads in the lake.
It started raining so on went the raincoats.
I wouldn't mind living there.
These rocks are made of ash or lava or something and float in the water.
I was feeding the baby in the car. Dad was keeping the kids entertained with water creatures.
Deacon wearing the ASU sweatshirt I bought for Maelie 9 years ago!
Our van with our Portugal license plate.
We walked along the road looking for fish swimming. We saw some big ones.
Some Portuguese were fishing and caught this huge fish. We asked them (charades like because they didn't speak any English) if we could take a picture.
Canoeing
Nice orange house!
After we got back to Ponta Delgada we walked around historic Ponta Delgada.
Each of these flags has the name of every city on this island.
Sterling was in his Batman PJ's. I'm not sure if we got a lot of looks because we had 5 kids or because he was wearing his Batman PJ's. :) A lot of the Portuguese people have 1 or 2 kids. They all looked shocked when we tell them they're all ours.
Ha ha, loved this. So fitting.
This statue was at a car sale lot. I have no idea what it means, but it looked cool.
It was such a nice evening for a walk. We saw some ice cream for sale and the kids wanted some. They kept reminding us that it was a treat day and they hadn't gotten a treat yet. We kept reminding them that it was Sunday. We compromised and told them that they would get 2 treats on Monday (Monday is also a treat day. We only have 2 treat days-Sunday and Monday so our kids definitely don't want to miss out).
Our Hotel sign-Hotel Do Colegio. There were a bunch of people in our hotel when we were from Boston. They were there on a trip with a Dental Group. The practice owner takes her people somewhere on a trip every year. It was fun to talk with them. They were amazed that we lived in the Azores. Some, like us, didn't even know the Azores existed until they went on their trip. They loved our kids.
The Lobby in the Hotel
The awesome picture spot across the street. If we were all in matching, nice picture clothes, I would've taken a family picture here.
On Monday we headed back to Furnas to go swimming in the hot springs. Our brakes started smoking really bad and it made us nervous. We said a prayer and the rain came, which cooled our brakes. We were very grateful and were able to continue on. The rest of the time in Sao Miguel they were fine.
At the Hot Springs:
There were other pools that were 39 degrees Celsius, which Denver and I LOVED, but we had to go to the pool that was 32 degrees Celsius because our two wimpy boys (Cole and Sterling) screamed and cried when they went in saying it was too hot, even though it really wasn't. Maelie and Garrett liked the hotter springs too. Deacon fell asleep in the pool. He has the life, taking a nap in a hot pool!
While in the hot springs we realized that we lived on the wrong island. Although we love the small, peaceful island of Terceira, there is so much more to offer in Sao Miguel. It has lakes and hot springs!
On the way back to our hotel we stopped at a beach and let the kids play in the water and sand. The water seemed warmer here than in Terceira. Sao Miguel is a bit more South, so it's possible the water really is warmer.
The kids and Dad made a...toothbrush?
On Tuesday we went to the food court in the mall.
They were sooooo excited to get crowns!
Then they wanted to ride this:
All four of them for 1 Euro. You can't beat that.
After lunch we decided to walk down to the pier to see if our boat was still leaving tomorrow as planned.
The lady at the Atlanticoline office said the ferry was cancelled for tomorrow because of the hurricane Nadine that was coming through. (it ended up being a tropical storm by the time it his us in Terceira and it was a cool storm. Had some cleanup to do). So the lady at the office told us that we could wait until next week when the ferry MIGHT leave again or they could fly us out and they would cover the flight expense. We definitely opted for the flight and asked about our van. She said they would put it on the next boat that was going to Terceira. In my head I was hoping that the next boat wouldn't be next May when they started going again, because we had taken the last scheduled boat. Anything can happen in the Azores.
We flew home (a wonderful, fast 30 minuted flight) on Tuesday night and arrived around 8pm. We were glad to be home, even though our car was still on vacation in Sao Miguel. There really is no place like home.
On Friday morning we found out that our van made it back to the island the night before and we could pick it up on Tuesday. We thought that was rubbish so we drove to the Pier to see if we could get it Friday instead and that's when we found out that because of the strike, no one would be working until Tuesday so there would be no one to process paper work and we had to wait. We saw our van sitting there, but had to leave without it. A bit frustrating, but we were just so grateful that it made it back and very quickly too, so we were okay with everything. We loved Sao Miguel. I would go again, but probably not on the last boat of the season.
