The volcano on Pico island

Dear Readers, one ferry ride and two planes later and here I am, home again to a bright sunny day, and news that I just missed seeing the aurora borealis over East Finchley. Damn! Well, I’ll just have to go to Iceland to see it instead. The garden is a jungle, but it’s so nice to sleep in my own bed again, though the cat has been celebrating my return by singing to me continually since day break.

I didn’t manage to post any video of one of our last sightings before I came home – there was a huge pod of Risso’s dolphins that were jumping and playing all around the rib boat. These are the most delightful blunt-headed dolphins – the babies are born grey, but dolphins are quite competitive, physical creatures, and every time an animal gets a bite, it leaves a white scar that doesn’t return to its original colour. As a result, adult males in particular look almost completely white, meaning that they are very visible under the water. Apologies to anyone prone to seasickness 🙂

Well, by now you’ll have gathered that taking photos on an RIB boat with 15 other people bobbing about is not an easy task, but I hope to post a gallery of rather better photos from some of the sharp-shooters in the group in the next couple of weeks.

So, some last thoughts.

• If you’re prone to seasickness and are planning on going whale watching, Stugeron seems to work for most people without making you feel too drowsy. I was really glad that I had some, though I didn’t need them myself.
• And on that subject, it’s always worth taking a few more painkillers/seasickness pills/stuff for upset stomachs than you think you’ll need, because even if you don’t need it, someone else will.
• If you have a dodgy back, sit towards the back of a RIB boat on any occasion (even one of those trips that they do up the Thames) – it might not be quite as exhilarating, but your vertebrae will thank you.
• There are no toilets on an RIB boat (or at least there weren’t on ours) and you can be out for five hours. Worth thinking  about if you have a bladder complaint.
• The sheer generosity of the portions of food on the Azores was amazing, and it was great value for money once you got there.
• If you go to the Azores, I recommend the whale watching company that we used, CW Azores. They took great care of everyone (and bear in mind that our group was probably twice as old as the usual demographic) and they are very respectful of the whales and dolphins.
• I fell in love with the Cory’s shearwaters  so I’m going to make a donation to the Portuguese Society for the Study of Birds – our guide Lara works for them, and they are doing amazing work for birds both on the Azores and Madeira, and on the Portuguese mainland. Although the Azores is working towards sustainable tourism, we still have to travel by plane to get there, and the boats all use fossil fuels, so this is one way of trying to offset the environmental damage and to repay the kindness and care of the people that helped us have such an amazing experience.

Sperm whale diving on our last day

Dear Readers, by the time you read this I will hopefully be back in East Finchley, and I am writing this on our last evening in tearing haste. I’m sure I’ll have more thoughts about the Azores once I’ve dealt with the massive pile of salty laundry that’s in my suitcase, but for now, let’s just be glad that I finally managed to take a photo of a big male sperm whale heading down a kilometre or two to munch on some giant squid….

Humpback whale diving

And that on our final day we also saw a humpback whale, and s/he was very obliging on the fluke front too.

So wish me luck with my ferry/plane from the Azores to Lisbon/flight from Lisbon to Heathrow/taxi home!

Dear Readers, it’s not all about the whales you know – Cory’s Shearwater is the bird that you’re most likely to see at sea. We often saw them resting in great rafts, eventually lifting themselves into the air when they saw the boat approach. The way they ran a few steps on the waves before gently lifting off was very endearing.

Cory’s Shearwater breeds only in the North Atlantic, with the Azores, Canaries and Madeira being their main breeding grounds. The fascinating thing is that at sea, these birds are completely silent, but last night we went to visit the rocky outcrops and cliffs where the birds nest. For most of the year they range widely over the whole Atlantic, with different birds following different migration paths, some reaching as far south as Patagonia, others veering off towards the UK and even Madagascar. However, the birds are monogamous and find one another at their nesting site every year, where they raise one fat, fluffy chick. They all leave in the autumn, and the one-in-ten of the chicks that survive will return to their original nesting ground.

What is truly remarkable is the sound that they make as they come into land at the end of the day. The male and the female have different calls, but each bird is unique, and their call helps them to find one another. Sometimes they’ve just been fishing separately for the day, but sometimes they are finding one another after months apart (the pairs often have different migratory locations). I have never heard anything like it. See what you think. You won’t be able to see the birds, but you’ll certainly be able to hear them. For some reason it made me cry, and laugh, simultaneously. Each recording is slightly different.

Sadly, a big problem for Cory’s Shearwaters is the increasing level of light pollution, and a campaign to encourage the turning off of unnecessary lights has been waged in the Azores and the other Atlantic islands. Sadly it doesn’t seem to be working that well on the island of Faial, right opposite where the birds I heard are nesting. We found two downed and disorientated shearwaters just sitting on the road as we made our way back. Fortunately we were able to shoo them back towards the rocks (and hopefully they’ll sort themselves out at day break) but you can see what a problem it will be when the chicks fledge. Let’s hope that more places learn to turn the lights off.

Dear Readers, we were of course delighted to see shedloads of sperm whales and several pods of bottlenosed dolphins today, but for me, the big excitement was a close encounter with a pair of fin whales. These are the second largest animals on earth after the blue whale, with a maximum length of 85 feet long. That little fin that you see on the back is a long, long way back on the whale’s body (see the image below) so, just as with an iceberg, what you see above the surface gives you no real idea of the size of the animal below.

Image from The International Whaling Commission athttps://iwc.int/about-whales/whale-species/fin-whale

One way to identify a fin whale is by that unusual asymmetric colouration on the lower lip – it’s white on the right side, and dark on the left side. We couldn’t see it clearly from the boat, but some conservation divers who are collecting data on the whales of the Azores managed to spot this distinguishing feature.

Fin whales really are built for speed – known as ‘the greyhound of the seas’, it regularly maintains speeds of 25 m.p.h, with bursts of up to 30 m.p.h. The two that we saw were not in a hurry but were still moving at a fair pace.

When we first saw the whales we thought that they might be blue whales, until we saw the distinctive lip colour. However, fin and blue whale hybrids do occur as their ranges overlap and clearly their customs and genetics are close enough to produce viable (though probably sterile) offspring. We know so little about these extraordinary animals.

When underwater, these whales are distinctly blue, which adds to the confusion.

Well, seeing these creatures made my day, and seeing a whole host of sperm whales only added to a great day. My back is aching from all that bouncing around on the RIB boat, my hair looks like Crystaltips from the children’s cartoon and I’m caked in a fine layer of salt, but it’s completely worth it. Only one more day to go before we head home, so let’s see what tomorrow brings…

Crystal Tipps and her dog Alistair

A whole gang of sperm whales (all male)

Sperm whale

Dear Readers, today dawned bright, sunny, and, most importantly, calm, and so at 9.15 we all donned our life jackets and got (very carefully) into our RIB boat for several hours at sea. Getting into and out of an RIB can be tricky when you’re older and stiffer, but the captain and crew could, I’m sure, manoeuvre a baby elephant into position without too much trouble, so we are all easy by comparison. And once on the water, off we go, and quickly encounter our first sperm whales.I think I’ve explained before that the resident sperm whales here are a group of females with their calves and juveniles, and they’re occasionally visited by the males. The females grow to about 36 feet long, while the males grow to about 52 feet. The babies are 13 feet long at birth. The young animals stay at the surface while their mothers dive to eat the squid that forms the main part of their diet – they can reach depths of up to 2km in search of them, which is even harder when you think that sperm whales are naturally very buoyant animals. They have various mechanisms that protect them from getting ‘the bends’ when they surface, but if they come up suddenly (for example if frightened by one of the undersea explosions much favoured by navies around the world) they can still be killed by the sudden change in pressure. Fortunately the whales around the Azores lead largely peaceful lives, with the biggest excitement likely to be the visit of a testosterone-fuelled male.

Anyhow, as sperm whales don’t make for the world’s most exciting photos, here instead is a little video. You might want to grab some seasickness pills first.

And we were visited by some more common dolphins, and again, here they are in action…\

On the way back we had a quick look at the island of Faial (where we arrived on Saturday). Below is the old lighthouse of Faial, badly-damaged in the earthquake of 1998. Nowadays it’s been replaced by a tiny little light.

Lighthouse on Faial

And below is theChurch of Nossa Senhora da Graça on the coast of Faial, the island opposite Pico where we’ve been staying. The churches of the Azores have a very distinct style, and are usually plastered white with details in darker volcanic rock. Most of the doors in Pico are either green or red, and this seems to be the case in this church too. It was also badly damaged in the earthquake of 1998, but has since been repaired.

Well, Readers, that’s all for now – we have another trip out in about twenty minutes, and some of us need to top up our suntan lotion. I shall report back!

The vineyards of P:ico

Dear Readers, the weather looks set fair for lots of whale-watching trips from Wednesday onwards, but today, although it wasn’t horizontal rain, it was way too choppy, so we settled for some more Azorean culture. First up was a trip to the south part of the island. We stopped off at a windmill (this one was used to grind corn) and to admire, yet again, the drystone walls that surround each little group of vines.

Azorean windmill

There are a lot of semi-natural bathing pools – some are just as nature intended, plus hand rails and changing rooms, and some have been helped along a bit by the repositioning of rocks. Some of the group are quite keen to give them a go, but let’s see how everyone gets on.

Natural bathing pool

I might have noted before about the tamarisk trees, which are African but have very high salt tolerance, and so have been planted everywhere. They’ve been pollarded and shaped in a very drastic way. There are lots of pollarded London Plane trees too.

Pollarded tamarisk trees

There was a huge storm here in 1893 which wiped out an entire village (of which more later), and here there is a shrine to Santa Rita, the patron saint of lost causes (my friend J gave me a token for the saint which I carry around everywhere, so I was delighted to see the saint here).

Many of the houses are built of the volcanic rocks, and the local sparrows were nesting in the tiny gaps between the stones.

Then we headed to see a village that was completely destroyed in the storm of 1893. On the way, though, I spotted the endemic euphorbia of the Azores. I must avoid becoming a complete plant nerd but, apart from the marine life, the plant life of the Azores is extremely interesting, being such a mixture of endemics, aliens and a whole bunch of invasives. We passed fields full of Lantana, and hedges wreathed in Morning Glory.

Azorean Euphorbia

You make your way down a very narrow, rubbly path. There’s a Cory’s Shearwater burrow…

At the bottom of the path you can see the remains of the village, now studded with ferns.

On the way back we came across this pretty thistle, which is native to Spain and has somehow gotten to the Azores via the Canary Islands and Madeira.

Purple milk thistle (Galactites tomentosa)

And then it was on to the Whaling Museum. Whaling was a big part of the Azorean culture and economy, petering out in 1984. The whales would be spotted from special watchtowers on the coast, and when a sperm whale was seen a firework would be sent up. The local whalers (who all worked at other things to supplement their paltry income) would jump into their boats and be towed out to the vicinity of the whale, before making their final approach by rowing up the whales.

An Azorean whaling boat from the museum at Lajes

The whale would be harpooned, but this was just to keep it close to the boat. The panicked whale would dive, but when it resurfaced  it would be repeatedly stabbed with lances, sometimes over a period of hours, until it died. Then it would be towed back to the village by the motor launches, to be cut up and for the whale oil to be sold. It was a brutal, bloody business, and so upsetting that several people had to leave the short film that we watched. It makes me wonder if some of the whales that we see now can actually remember when their kin were hunted. Sperm whales were hunted in particular because they’re much slower and more buoyant than most other whales, and also because they floated when dead. I am only glad that now the spotters look out for whales so that people can watch them respectfully, and that this is now how the islanders make a living.

Some of the scrimshaw (drawings on whale bone and whale ivory (usually from the teeth) was the most beautiful and detailed that I’ve seen anywhere.

Some whale bone was even turned into toys, like these doll beds and cribs.

And so, it’s hard to think about what used to happen to the whales that we’ve travelled so far to admire and enjoy, but it’s also important to remember how hard life was here, how cut off people were, and how difficult it was to make any kind of living. Plus, the Azoreans are working hard to make their tourism industry sustainable, and they no longer hunt whales, unlike Iceland or Norway or the Faroe or Lofoten islands. It gives me hope that things can change, even a cultural tradition as deeply embedded as whaling in these distant, rocky islands.

And tomorrow, fingers crossed, I’ll be able to report on some more whales. The weather looks set fair for the rest of the week, the wind is dying down, and I for one am raring to go!

Dear Readers, as the Azores are stuck in the middle of the North Atlantic it’s no wonder that the weather is changeable and today it’s ‘blowing a hooly’ as my Scottish pals would say, along with a spot of horizontal rain. So, no whale watching, but we did have a few expeditions to explore the culture and history of the Azores. It’s always good to put things into context, and to be honest I wouldn’t want to be stuck in a RIB boat in this weather, plus the swell is something else.

So, first up we went to the wine museum. The Azores used to be famous for their wines, but, as with many other places, the vines became infected with dusty mildew and phylloxera, and had to be removed back in the nineteenth century. However, recently viniculture has made a comeback – Pico in particular has rich, volcanic soil, and the unique method of growing the vines has been given a UNESCO designation.

What’s so special about Azorean wine? Firstly, each vine is grown in its own little cell, made up of volcanic walls in a way that’s very similar to drystone walls.

Model of the volcanic rock walls used to grow vines

The walls protect the vines from the wind and rain, but more importantly from the salt water. However, it means that the vines grow very close to the ground, which makes them very labour-intensive both to prune and at harvest time. This means that Azorean wine is extremely expensive – while you can get a bottle of mainland Portuguese wine for less than 5 euros, the average price of a bottle of Azorean wine is closer to 25 euros. Nonetheless I shall see if some of my fellow travellers want to share a bottle later in the week, so that I can report back. The things I do for my Readers!

Furthermore, some of the grapes are turned into the Azorean version of grappa, a highly distilled spirit. It reminded me most of the time that I shared a cup of methylated spirits with a homeless man called Joe when I worked at the night shelter in Dundee. Actually that’s a little unfair, but it’s strong stuff with a lingering fiery quality that makes me think instantly of heartburn. it comes in many flavours, which might help to offset the effect.

The Azoreans also make a wide variety of different gins. Dad would have approved.

The old distillery

And then it was on to the geology museum – the Azores, as I’ve mentioned before, are on the edges of no less than three tectonic plates, so they regularly have earthquakes (in fact you can download an Azores Earthquake app), and in 1998 the neighbouring island of Faial had a major earthquake which killed 10 people and left 2500 homeless. Anyhow, here in Pico they have embraced new technology in the museum sector, so first of all you can sit in a circular cinema and experience a journey to the centre of the earth. Who knew that being surrounded by molten iron at the earth’s core would be so painless? I did get a bit of a sweat on, though, which hopefully helped to evaporate some of the dampness from my wet trousers.

The pod of geology

Even more excitingly, we then got to experience an earthquake, wearing VR goggles and standing on a shaking platform. 23 seconds (the length of the first earthquake( can seem a very long time when you’re in what appears to be a welter of falling masonry. It was the first time that I’d ever used VR goggles, and they were pretty cool, so I guess I’m Down With the Kids now.

The wobbly earthquake simulator

Anyhow, Readers, I am writing this and it’s only 14.38 – later this afternoon we’re off to see some lava tubes, and you can read all about them here. If I get a chance, I’ll report back later in the week – the weather still looks a bit dodgy tomorrow so we might still be whale-less, but I’m sure there will be something else to see. Anyhow, I’ll keep you posted!

Dear Readers, today we actually managed to get out into the North Atlantic to look for whales. We’re travelling in RIB boats (Rigid Inflatable Boat), which means that you bounce across the ocean on what feels like a bucking bronco. I sit in the less desirable seats at the back (largely because I have a dodgy back) which means I don’t get walloped quite as much as the boat climbs the waves and then crashes down again. It’s all rather exhilarating.

Sperm Whales!

My main reason for wanting to come to the Azores was to see the sperm whales – there is a group of females and juveniles who are resident here all year round, making them relatively easy to keep track of. We saw probably about 15 whales during two trips, and on several occasions we saw females with calves who appeared to be feeding – sperm whale mums produce a very thick, fatty milk which doesn’t immediately wash away in the water, so you can see the calves diving down to feed and then bobbing up again. The females sometimes feed a calf that isn’t their own, a behaviour called allosuckling, which is extremely rare – apparently the only other mammals that do it are feral cats and African elephants (and occasionally humans).

I just loved seeing them. What extraordinary animals they are! My photos don’t do them justice, but I thought it was more important to just sit and take in the experience. I suspect that some of the other people on the trip might have some great photos, so hopefully quality might improve later.

We also saw a pod of common dolphin, probably about 100 in total – they were showing mating behaviour (one dolphin rolls onto its back as an invitation) and there was a lot of jumping and tearing around. These dolphins have a pale yellow patch on their side, and are smallish creatures, fast and elegant.

Common dolphin (Photo by By Mmo iwdg – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10262057)

And finally we saw a Portuguese Man O War. It’s not actually a jellyfish, though it looks like one – these animals are siphonophores, a colony of different organisms. It has a nasty sting, which is mainly used to kill the fish that are its prey. They can also cause severe pain in humans, and apparently the treatment is immersion of the affected part in water at 45 degrees for 20 minutes, which sounds pretty uncomfortable to me! A Portuguese Man O War looks so much like a plastic bag that it’s no wonder that turtles are munching on plastic bags by mistake.

And now, dear Readers, I am off to bed. It’s been a long day of bouncing about, and that, combined with the sea air, is definitely turning my thoughts towards sleep. More tomorrow!

The town of Horta on the Island of Faial

Dear Readers, it was a 4.30 start this morning, to catch our flight from Lisbon to the Azorean island of Faial and the town of Horta. I ordered what I thought was a black coffee and a white coffee once we were airside, but my white coffee ended up with ice in it. I managed to resist the blandishments of the pastry shop though. I suspect the Portuguese must have a sweet tooth. They were even selling pasteis de nata (those delicious little custard tarts) in packs of 12.

Anyhoo, the plane was rammed, and for most of the time we were flying over the Atlantic (the Azores are nearly 1000 miles west of Portugal). But then, this….

The Azores are volcanic, and this is Pico, the most recent of the Azores to emerge from the sea and with its very own volcano, the Ponta de Pico. The volcanic soil means that there are vineyards here (UNESCO-designated to boot) and I have no doubt that we’ll be visiting them later. We landed, however, on the island of Faial, which is 30 minutes by ferry from Pico, and which is technically the western-most point in Europe.

We landed along a short runway right next to the sea. Could this be another Category C airport like Innsbruck, I wondered? But actually, no, although Funchal in Madeira is. Hah! The landing still occasioned a burst of applause from the back of the plane. And my luggage arrived, a relief as I’d checked it all the way through at Heathrow and we all know how that can sometimes work out.

Horta airport

We had a couple of hours to kill before our flight, so we did some exploring. What a fine town Horta is! Tomorrow they have a trail run with 3000 people turning up, so I was glad I was there today. There was a very noisy parade of emergency vehicles, all driven by moustachioed men in uniform, most wearing medals.

The buildings are so charming here, with a mixture of Spanish/Portuguese influences and something very quirky and different.

We had lunch in the local market, where I just managed not to buy a six-foot long cushion shaped like a sperm whale. One must have some discipline, surely.

And then it was off to the ferry for the trip to Pico, our final stop.

We watched with some confusion as various vehicles backed onto the ferry at peculiar angles, but were pleased to see a chap who drove a tractor onboard – it seemed to be towing a container full of all our bags, and some miscellaneous baskets.

it’s fair to say that not everybody has got this parking-in-a-straight-line thing down pat…

And now we’re on Pico, in our hotel, and tomorrow, weather willing, we should be off to finally see if we can find some whales! Keep everything crossed for us!

View from my hotel window

Well Readers, so far so far good – I’ve managed to get from East Finchley to an airport hotel at Lisbon Airport, in preparation for our flight to the Azorean island of Pico tomorrow. Points to note at Heathrow Terminal Two are:

• A couple of the security lanes now have those antsy-fancy scanners where you don’t have to take out your laptop or your liquids. It makes such a difference to the time it takes to get through! On the other hand, if you’re me you’re still wearing your walking boots (aka the most comfortable footwear in the world) so you still hold everybody up while you hop around on one leg.
• Heathrow now has little purple Roombaa-type vacuum cleaners. Every child under five seems to love following them around and then running away screaming when they change direction.
• Portugal from the air is full of onshore wind turbines, all arranged in rows along the hills. I’m very interested to see what the Azores does about renewable energy. I’d expect there to be lots of wind/solar/hydro and maybe even some geothermal, but let’s see. Islands everywhere are leading the way in the search for clean energy.
• I got confused at the airport and tried to go through the EU gates with my passport (because I still have a red one). But of course I have to go through the UK gates because I am, in fact, from the UK. Still heartbroken.

Anyhow, we met our guide at the airport – Lara is Portuguese and did a doctorate on social weaverbirds in South Africa so we’ll have a lot in common. The rest of the group seem really lovely and laidback, which is great. And the hotel is very nice – I have a splendid view of the roundabout, which features bushes which seem to have been trimmed to resemble the Devil’s Causeway.

We all piled out of the lift (once we’d worked out that you have to use your room key to make it work) and went in search of our rooms. Below is a typical door.

How in the inky-dinky are you supposed to know which room is which? Four intelligent women and one intelligent chap paraded from one end of the corridor to the other and we were all stumped. Until….

It’s easy when you know how, clearly….

So tomorrow, we are meeting at 5.30 a.m. in reception (breakfast opens at 4.00 a.m.). No whales tomorrow apparently as it’s too rough, but we should get out in the boats on Sunday. So, I’ll report back from The Actual Azores tomorrow if all goes to plan.