In addition to a change of aircraft, the flight from Madeira was scheduled to depart an hour earlier than yesterday. Why? I have no idea. Because of all this, we had a relatively early breakfast at 8am, checked out, and drove to the Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport . . .again.
It was relatively seamless dropping the car off compared to our previous experience. The airport was busier than the previous day, but our flight was fairly empty. We were issued seats upon checkin and had a row to ourselves. We had some decent views of the island and the town of Funchal as we departed.
The flight was about an hour and a half long, and we even got a light lunch served on board. As expected, it was mostly overcast over the Azores when we approached. This chain of islands is known to be a bit rainy, but we had anticipated this. We touched down in Ponta Delgada, collected our baggage, and then waited in line for yet another rental car. Of course, Ilha Verde, the local company we chose had the longest line . . .most likely due to the fact that they were by far the cheapest.
After another 30 minutes slipped away, we finally had our car. Our Air BnB host had initially stated that we would meet for checkin at 4pm, but it was now just 2, so we decided to drive to the western side of the island since it wasn’t presently raining and it is forecast to be an absolute washout tomorrow. While it initially seemed promising, the weather quickly deteriorated as we started climbing the mountains.
We parked near an overlook for a little while seeing if the rain would subside, but it did not. We then drove back toward town and our BnB, where we coordinated a slightly earlier checkin. Our place is called the pineapple palace. Unsurprisingly it is pineapple themed, inspired by all the locally-grown pineapple. The landscape of the Azores reminds us both of a place like Ireland or the UK. It definitely gets enough rain, but unlike those two places, it has a subtropical climate that apparently supports things like pineapple.
After getting settled and making a quick stop at a local supermarket, we decided to head back out and give the lookout another try as the weather and visibility seemed to be clearing a bit. As we climbed the mountain once more, the mist and fog rolled in as before, though the rain wasn’t along with it. While we had expected rain, what we hadn’t accounted for was the upslope fog that basically cuts visibility down to nothing.
Just to be sure, we went on a ten minute trail that led to a viewpoint overlooking a caldera. The only problem was that such a caldera could not be seen. Mist and fog simply blasted over the overlook area so that everything just looked white. It didn’t present too many photo taking opportunities.
Despite our lack of success, we figured we would try another nearby viewpoint. The road went downhill just slightly and apparently that was enough. That put us below the cloud bases and we could actually see more than three feet in the distance. The viewpoint was called Vista do Rei, and didn’t require any hiking this time. We were the only people present. At this point, even the sun was starting to poke through a little bit. That being said, the prior overlook with the hike still appeared to be socked in the clouds, and it didn’t look like that would change anytime soon.
After a few minutes we got back in the car and headed back into town. We later tried to figure out dinner, but that was also a bit of a bust. We drove into the city center where most restaurants are located, but the good ones had lines out the door, and the bad ones were . . .bad. The town of Ponta Delgado is a bit bizarre. The town seems completely dead with the exception of restaurants. Many buildings look abandoned and all the other shops seem to be closed.
We abandoned our own search for dinner in town, and instead went back to the supermarket to buy some pasta to cook back at our place. It was one of our latest dinners yet, so we will have to plan accordingly if we actually want to go out for dinner tomorrow night. Tomorrow has something like an 80% chance of rain all day, so we have no definite plans. We shall see where the day takes us.
passports & pepto bismol 