Hidden treasure of Europe – the Azores (part 2)
This is a
blog on our trip to Azores, part 2. You can find the first part of this blog here
(a link to an external site – my personal blog).
After some
days in Ponta Delgada we went to explore the island of Sao Miguel. Prior our
arrival we rented a car in one of the local car rentals. We got a silver
coloured Kia Piccanto – a small,
versatile car. It was already quite worn-out, the first gear was a bit
problematic (well, when I say problematic I mean – not working at all...), the
tyres were quite worn, the chassis were a bit rusty, but on overall it still
was a good car (especially taking into account the small amount of money we
paid for it) and did serve us well.
Our first
destination of the day was Ribeira Grande
– a small town in the north of the island. On our way out of Ponta Delgada we
got lost a bit, visited the airport again instead of driving to the north, but
those were only minor issues. At this point I need to clarify: we don't use a
care back here in Riga – we both live in the city centre and we don't actually
need a car. That is why I don't even have a drivers licence, but Anna is
driving a car very occasionally. In fact at that moment she hadn't driven a car
for a while (some 5-7 years). So the beginning for our journey was... exciting.
:)
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| Ribeira Grande |
Still, we
found the right road to the north and in a matter of time we already parked the
car in middle on Ribeira Grande. The
town has a beautiful bridge which is the main landmark, there are some museums
(but we didn't visit them), and it is the first place where we saw the ocean
waves. There is nothing much you can actually do in the town (still there are
some good dining places and museums), so we spent there only some 2 hours. On
the way out of Ribeira Grande we took
the wrong turn and found ourselves in a rural area, but actually we were quite
happy about that – it was the first place where we met the famous local cows, were
we saw the bamboo growing, and the landscape there was absolutely stunning.
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| In the middle of nowhere, near Ribeira Grande |
The funny
thing we discovered only after Ribeira
Grande – we were driving with the handbrake on. :) On our way to Ribeira Grande we were wondering that
car lacks power uphill J
But the
main goal of the day was to reach the tea plantations. Yes, Azores is the only
place in Europe where tea is grown for commercial purposes. I must say our
visit to the tea plantation was one of the highlights of the trip to Azores.
There are two tea plantations on Sao Miguel – Cha Gorreana and Cha Porto Formoso. They are located
close to each other, but we chose to visit Cha Gorreana, possibly only because
we missed Cha Porto Formoso... :) I
will always remember the scent in the air when we opened the doors of our car.
It's like to be in a small room filled with strong green tea flavour. The scent
was unbelievably strong and rich.
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| Cha Gorreana |
The interesting thing is the factory – the tea
that is grown in the fields around is 100% processed in the factory of Cha Gorreana. Furthermore tea is processed
in a traditional way, with the same kind of equipment that was used centuries
ago. You can arrange an excursion in the factory, but we were lucky enough to
join a small group of tourists. Although the excursion was on Portuguese in our
case, we did understand the vast majority of the process – you don't really have
to hear the explanation, everything is clear enough. J After the excursion we bought some of the tea
in the factory shop (still you can buy the same tea all around the island,
sometimes it's even cheaper). We also bought some blackberry jam, which is the
favourite one for me, but is rarely available back here in Latvia. You can also
watch a film on Cha Forreana in a
small, improvised cinema. :) And don't forget to visit the tea plantations
themselves. That is especially interesting if you've never been to SE Asia and
never seen the tea plantation.
We would
definitely recommend a visit to the plantation – both of the tea plantations
can be found on the north of Sao Miguel, just some 15km to the east of Ribeira Grande. And
don't forget to stop at the Miradouro
– beautiful viewing spots (there are road signs indicating the location of
them) on the way. There are some stunning landscapes in the north of Sao
Miguel.
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| View from one of the Miradouro |
In the next
blogs – about our trip to Furnas, Povoacao,
Lagoa do Fogo.
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| Cha Gorreana |
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