Azores Airline came through! We didn’t arrive in Ponta Delgado until nearly 7:30, with a connection to Horta at the same time. As we deplaned onto the tarmac, an Azores’ agent greeted us and asked if we were connecting to Horta. She immediately herded us through customs and security.
After retrieving and rechecking our bags, we rushed to the gate and were the last to board. They had held the plane for us; departed about 8:00. We took the last two seats on a prop plane that had a capacity of 37.
We had about a 30-minute flight to Terceira. We landed at the old Lajes US AFB, which was partially being used as a small commercial airport. We had to deplane and go inside to check-in to continue our flight to Horta. Back on the same plane, and a 30-minute flight, we arrived in Horta.
Our bags were some of the first to come off and a driver was waiting for us. It was only a 10-minute drive to the city; but our driver, Victor, gave us a 20-minute driving tour of the city center.
We checked into Hotel Horta, but only had 50 Euro bills and owed Victor only 13 Euro.
Poor Victor had to go to two places to get change.
All the rooms in Hotel Horta have seaview rooms with views of Mount Pico. After settling in, we walked down to the harbor where yacht crews from all over the world paint pictures/cartoons and oftentimes the year or years when they were there. They say Horta has the largest maritime painting collection in the world with over 1,000 yachts coming through each year.
From the harbor we walked to the town square, Praca da Republica, where the City Hall and main church are connected. A pretty flower garden accents the front.
We strolled past a cute little church where we met Victor walking. He told us he was baptized in that church, St. Augusto. He also shared with us the reason for him being back in Horta after years in Canada, Brazil, etc. is because of his ailing parents. We took a look inside the church and found it to be quite beautiful.
From the church, we started looking for Porto Pim, a cafe near the city beach, where we wanted to go for lunch.
We ended up walking a half mile the wrong direction, which we blamed on poor signage. After back tracking we finally arrived. Even though it had begun to drizzle and was a little chilly, but we opted to sit outside under an awning where we had draft beers, chicken soup, and a weird sandwich (dough with tomato sauce). It was a nice spot with a view of a narrow beach and a former whale processing plant, converted to a museum (pointed out by Victor). Victor had told us that while growing up he swam at the beach but that on whale processing days, you could not swim because the water was red. A church dominated the the top of the hill that rose above the shoreline. We talked of walking up to the church as practice for our eventual Mt. Pico hike, talk proved cheap! We did take the, level walk, to the remnants of a stone-walled fort that sat at the head of the harbor. Candidly, it looked better while looking at it from the cafe than up close.
Walking back into the city center, we were still a little hungry so we went to a coffee shop and got two coffees and a piece of cake that looked like tiramisu, but turned out to be pretty dry, more biscuit like, nothing close to tiramisu!
We decided we were really tired after having no sleep on the plane so walked back to the hotel for a quick nap.
We both slept for about an hour and a half, got up and showered and went down to the lobby to wait for Karl and Carol. They arrived on time, checked in and we headed out for dinner. We checked out the colorful harbor again and went to Peter’s Cafe for the infamous gin and tonic. Peter’s is a lively bar/restaurant near the marina that also has a scrimshaw museum (etched whale bones and teeth). We did not go into the museum but had gin and tonics made with their own gin which was outstanding.
We had made a reservation at Genuino’s, a highly rated seafood restaurant in the Porto Pim area. We had a wonderful, first dinner in the Azores of octopus, fish and squid. As we paid the bill to leave, we were each treated with a free liquor; two honeys, one blackberry and one that tasted like grappa. Only Karl could tolerate the grappa!
Back up the hill to our hotel for a good night’s sleep.
2025-02-07