Azores

Ever since I heard about the Azores I've wanted to go check them out. They call it Europe's Hawaii, and there are definitely some similarities since both are volcanic islands in the middle of oceans. The Azores are about a tenth of the size of Hawaii though, and were an important shipping route back in the exploration years. So while they are Portuguese, they also have British, Flemish and Spanish influence, as a lot of countries tried to set up shop here. Makes for interesting and beautiful architecture, and there are a lot of little ghost towns and abandoned summer homes straight out of a zombie apocalypse.

City gate of Ponta Delgada

Also, it smells. The first thing we all noticed when the plane landed was it smelled like cow manure. We figured we were just near a farm, but turns out the entire island is overrun with cows.

Cow outside our hotel window

But it was beautiful, and you can't smell pictures. We did what felt like a million different enchanted forest / waterfall hikes, and explored the volcanic bubbles of Parque da Grená. And there was a cat that Evie fell in love with that we nicknamed Lil Chonkers, and he was fed a little of our Cozido das Furnas (traditional Portuguese dish cooked in the earth by hot volcanic steam).

Two person at a time bridge...

The Azores are known for their naturally occurring hot springs. We went to three inland hot springs (only pics of two). I'm not going to lie, they were very cool (or warm), but a bit crowded at times and not quite as pretty or with the design and infrastructure of Tabacon, in Costa Rica (still the best place ever in my book to experience hot springs).

Velha de Caldeira

Terra Nostra. The iron gives it that color. 

At the next hot springs, Dona Beija (not pictured), we made ourselves iron facial masks and it took Evie 48 hours to fully wash it off.

The one hot spring stand out was Ponte da Ferraria, which I understand is the only place in the world where volcanic steam / rock heats up ocean water at low tide, and you can experience an "Oceanic Hot Tidal Pool." Low tide was early in the morning while we were there and it was the other side of the island, so we got up early, got our Egg McMuffins (yep, first Mickey D's stop in Portugal and the kids were so hyped), and got to the edge of the world. We had missed the low tide marker by about an hour, and a couple people were leaving, so we had the whole cove to ourselves for a little bit. It is an incredible place. There is a ladder cemented to volcanic rock and some ropes in the water so you have something to hang onto and don't slam into rocks or each other when these huge, turquoise waves rush in with cool water, and then the water that runs back into the ocean is hot tub warm. It felt so good, and magical. Eventually a Polish family joined us, and 10 minutes later a few others started coming down, but the water was already starting to get cooler and more violent with the rising tide, so we moved on. It was our trip highlight for sure.

Bird's eye view

The other awesome thing to do in Sao Miguel is look at lakes. The island just has crazy topography, all of these lakes so close to the ocean, separated by ridges of volcanic, fertile (mostly grazing land now) soil. We hiked a few, and we drove to a couple, but here are a few of our favorites:

Lagoa de Fogo "Lagoon of Fire" (was not hot)

Lago das Furnas

Lagoa de Santiago

Blue and Green Lake in Sete Cidades at Vista Rei

The coastline in Ribeira Grande wasn't too shabby either:

Our last night there we even got to have an excellent Azorean dinner with a couple familiar faces :)

All in all the Azores are incredibly unique and gorgeous, and we enjoyed exploring São Miguel. On the flight back we were a little travel fatigued, and a little sad that we are nearly 2/3rds done with our Portuguese adventure. These last few weeks especially have flown by, but we are grateful for all the memorable experiences.