Sunday 14 June,  2015

Horta, Faial, Azores  38 31.9N 28 37.0W

Today's Blog by Richard  (Time zone: BST -1.0; UTC)

We have had a few days “at rest” in Horta and are preparing to slip our moorings for Flores. While this is in the “wrong” direction, current weather forecasts suggest we can’t commence our passage back to the UK until at least the weekend. So, we have time to visit Flores (which sounds idyllic) and pootle back to the main group of islands with a “plan” to leave from Graciosa when the weather window permits.

We are now officially back in Europe and spending euros makes it seem like we are almost home. Horta has proved to be a delightful place – very nice people, attractive architecture and a good standard of restaurant. And it is much cheaper than Bermuda (eg our marina bill for four nights was less than half the cost of one night in Bermuda!). Here is some nice architecture:

Horta is a classic stopover for yachts crossing the Atlantic and a practice has grown up of crews painting their yachts’ names and insignia on the harbour walls:

Horta is also home to a pair of black swans, something of a rarity:

From our mooring, we have had daily views of the highest mountain in Portugal – actually, the next door island of Pico, whose volcanic peak stands at 2,350m.

Yesterday, we hired a car to have a look around the island of Faial. Peter was our chauffeur and, once he got the hang of the car and the roads, he was flying around the mountain bends like a local. We were able to see a caldeira (circular or elliptical depression caused by volcanic activity) and the place of the most recent volcanic eruptions in 1957:

And the Azores’ resident Hell’s Angels (who were all very nice people!)

Finally, in case you think this blog is a geography lesson, here are (a) Peter demonstrating how to balance when we are sailing on our ear and (b) David enjoying his birthday present: