Terceira: A Jewel in the Mid- Atlantic

Since Diya started to study and later work in the lovely island of Faial in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, we have visited the Azores, an autonomous region of Portugal, on several occasions. Comprising small volcanic islands, the Azores are nine tiny specs of green in the vast blue expanse of the Atlantic, midway between Europe and North America. This time Diya planned a small holiday for us in Terceira, or literally the ‘third’, but in fact the second largest among the nine islands. At 8 am sharp the Atlanticoline ferry left the Horta terminal, with holiday makers as well as locals. Horta and Terceira are part of a cluster of five islands that also include Pico, Sao George and Graciosa and our ferry stopped at Pico and Sao George before terminating at Pria de Vitoria in Terceira. 

The six and half hour journey was leisurely but spectacular with the 2300-metre-tall Pico forming a backdrop for most of the way, and small boats and birds keeping us company from time to time. The ferry took on vehicles as well as passengers and was comfortable but not luxurious. It had seats on two floors and on the top deck and a small café selling coffee, sandwiches, and drinks. It was named after one brave local sailor Gilberto Mariano da Silva who operated the daily crossings between Horta and Pico throughout the year, even in inclement weather. There is also a statue of Gilberto in the harbour of Pico Madalena commemorating this intrepid seaman.   [pix – Pico, Boat, Sea]

The India Connection

Our hotel Azoris Angra Garden was bang on the city centre of Angra de Heroismo the main city of Terceira. We were very hungry after a frugal breakfast of dry sandwiches at the ferry café and had a hot meal in an open-air café next to our restaurant. Diya insisted that she had to visit the beach and immediately after lunch we went looking for it. No sooner had we spotted the sea, than we saw a slaty grey figure dressed in medieval clothes in the centre of the street. At first it seemed like those many men and women who dress up like statues in silver, slate or gold and pose for tourists in many European cities. We walked closer and saw we were mistaken. It was a life size statue of Vasco da Gama, who had visited the city on his way back from India in 1499. His brother Paolo, who had accompanied him on his voyage to India had fallen sick on the way back and had died in Angra. After burying his brother in Terceira Vasco made his way back to the mainland. 

Initially I was a little intrigued why ships to India which had to go South towards Africa and then swing around the Cape of Good Hope needed to come so far west from Europe. The next day we learnt that Terceira was an important transit port in the trade between India and the Americas to catch the favourable trade winds that would take ships from Europe going either towards the east or the west they had to pass through here.            

We learnt many more interesting things about the history of Terceira from our guide Juan who took us around the island the next day in his spanking new Tesla. Portuguese sailors are officially credited for discovering Azores in early 15^th Century, and Terceira was initially its most important island. However, the Italians as well as the Flemish are also supposed to have played a key role. The story goes that when the islands were first discovered, the sailors went back to the mainland and got some goats and cattle and left them on the islands. Later they returned and looked for the animals they had left behind. The animals had not only survived but also found out the sources of fresh water where the first homesteads were established. Later when Spain had attacked Portugal and overrun it in the 16^th Century, the King of Portugal had fled to Terceira and this small island had the privilege to be his entire realm. We also learnt how the island women had repelled an attack of the Spanish by creating a cattle run. Seeing the Spanish soldiers come up a hill, the story goes, the women rounded up their cattle and then provoked a cattle stampede towards them. Seeing the long-horned beasts running towards them the Spanish turned tail. Today the islanders celebrate this victory by a locally brewed beer, ‘Brianda’.

   [ Pix – Vasco, Brianda beer, Tile painting of the Battle]       

Bread and Roses

As we drove around the hills and valleys of the island our guide-cum-driver, Dom Juan Pereira, had a steady stream of stories about the island, most of it in Portuguese. We would receive titbits in translation from Diya. One fascinating story was the story around the Imperio. Each village had a small very smartly painted room raised on a platform. In most places the Imperio was close to the church. Each of these Imperios had paintings or painted tiles of food and celebration on its exterior walls. 

We were intrigued, so Dom Juan filled in that Imperios were places of celebration and communal dining. They harked back to time when people were poor, and many didn’t have enough to eat. A legendary queen Saint Isabel would arrange to give bread to all the poor. The king was not pleased with this and forbade her. However, the queen continued, hiding the bread in the folds of her voluminous skirt. The king confronted her one day as she was going out asking her what she was carrying. Roses she replied, and the king challenged her to show them to him. The queen opened the folds of her skirt, and the bread had indeed turned to roses. 

Later in the week when we had returned to Faial, we were very privileged to be invited by one of Diya’s friends to a communal feast at the Imperio in his village. The signature dish was ‘sopash’ or a soup with beef with cabbages and spices stewed overnight, which is had with local sweet corn bread dipped into it. We sat in a tent with tables arranged in long rows and were served sopash and beef roast with local red wine. 

For dessert there was a creamy rice pudding delicately flavoured with lemon zest. The atmosphere was festive, and it reminded us so much of the communal back at home, either during the pujas or at weddings when food was not arranged through caterers.  [Pix – Imperio, Imperio wall, Sopash]

 

Journey to the Centre of the Earth

Terceira, like all the other Azorean islands has a volcanic origin, but unlike Pico or Faial it doesn’t have a defining peak or caladera, towering over the island. Instead, there is more than one peak and caldera giving it a more undulating landscape over the millennia. Much of the island is covered with local trees, a variety of juniper and bright yellow-coloured flowers of ginger lily bushes. The rest are rolling pastures with cattle grazing peacefully. Cheese-making is the biggest economic activity of the island. At the edge of the largest caldera which is more like a giant bowl are a line of windmills and a series of antenna. Terceira is a NATO base, and this hilltop was a strategic listening station in the middle of the Atlantic. However, the volcanic origins of Terceira are not hidden as we learnt very soon in this idyllic pastureland. [pix – bowl-caldera, windmills] 

We were eager to visit the Algar do Carvao, a volcanic cave in the centre of the island that was highly recommended by all tourist guides of the island. We were totally unprepared for what we experienced. It was magical or even surreal. We drove up to the top of a hill and there was a small hut-like structure recessed into the rock. We bought our tickets and started walking down some stairs down a tunnel. Suddenly we entered the vent of a volcano. High above us was a small circular opening with the sky above and the stairs wound down into the bowels of the earth. A row of people, becoming progressively smaller, walked down or up on the staircase hugging the wall of a giant upturned cone that was the inside of the volcano. 

The walls were moist and densely matted with ferns and mosses. As we went down the shaft of the volcano sunlight became feebler but was well lit with electric lights revealing the many hues of the volcanic cone. One path led further down where there was a small pool of water while another branched into a giant cavern. The surface of the cavern was craggy but in places had delicately patterned hanging objects looking like stalactites. But these were volcanic formations and not formed of minerals from evaporating water droplets. Dom Juan was always at our side explaining different aspects of the stunning rock formations all around us. After a certain point we could go no further, even though we could see tunnels branching in different directions. At this point we were nearly 100 metres deep into the heart of an old volcano. [pix – at least three]

Close was the Furnas do Enxofre, another volcanic formation where over large stretch of land there are numerous sulfur vents that gently spew smoke. Dom Juan asked us to feel the earth and it was hot to the touch. There was a winding walkway skirting past the smoking land, the air was thick with the smell of sulfur. [video].

When we reached the Gruta do Natal, or the Christmas Cave, the staff were getting ready to shut up shop for the day, but since there was still some time left, we were given white helmets and shown the way down into the cave. Unlike the Algar do Carvao, this was not a volcanic shaft but a lava tube where the lava flowed and exited through fissures rather than through one dramatic outburst. Today these are empty jagged tubes of uneven height, branching in different directions. In one place the cave had opened into a slightly larger hall-like space, and this was where once there was a Christmas mass giving the cave system its name. While in most places it was comfortable to walk there were places where the roof was really low, and I was knocked on my helmet by jagged rocks which jutted out. At one point the tube was so low that one had to nearly crawl on all fours. If this description reads a little claustrophobic, perhaps it was, but at the same time, it was fascinating as one could see the layers of lava flowing and solidifying and leaving their mark behind the walls.

Our last stop of the day for the day was the village of Biscoitos where the land meets the sea, not as a beach but a series of tide pools. These tide pools formed as the lava flowed into the sea and through centuries of erosion, are now very popular for swimming. It being quite late by now, we did not get into the sea and watched the ocean crash into the outer walls of the tide pools while the water inside was calm as a swimming pool.

A jewel in the mid-Atlantic

Our hotel was right in the middle of the prettiest city centre you can imagine. European city centres, often look like picture postcards, especially to our South Asian eyes, but the Angra city centre was different. Angra do Heroismo is a small city on a small island, and the buildings, streets and even its churches were smaller than you would expect on the mainland. The city is strewn with Churches, monasteries, and convents and some have now been put to non-ecclesiastic use. The city museum was once a convent and the one-time Governor’s residence, and an accompanying church were now a museum and government office. The city has several parks and gardens, with the many tiered Jardim Duque da Terceira, right behind our hotel. The city was destroyed in an earthquake in 1980, but everything has been built back, mostly as it was, and today the city centre is a World Heritage site. While there were many tourists, you could see there were many in the streets who were locals. And the locals loved to hang out at many cafes that lined the streets in the city centre. It wasn’t surprising many were older, but that didn’t stop the cafes ringing with laughter and chatter well into the night.

The city of Angra is situated about 20 kilometers from Praia de Vittoria which has the both the airport and the ferry terminal. It faces the sea through a small bay that has a small beach and a small marina. On one side is Monte Bresil, a now extinct volcano that is said to have risen separately and then joined the main island. At the other end of the bay is the rundown Fort of Sao Sebastian. Monte Bresil also has a fort, the Fort of Sao Joao Baptista, and currently hosts a military contingent. Visitors can walk past the sentry at the main gate then up a trail that leads to the top where there is the Miraduoro do Pico Cruzinhas, an ornamental cross on a pillar flanked by old and rusty anti-aircraft guns on two sides.

We spent the rest of the time exploring the city on foot, visiting Churches and Museums, walking to the Miraduoro on the top of Monte Bresil, hanging out in cafes; savouring Dona Amelia cakes that were first made honouring Queen Dona Amelia when she visited the island in 1901. This was an important occasion, and a special bull run was organised in which the King is said to have participated. Bull running is a favourite past time in the island, and a shiny black statue of the jumping bulls adorns the main roundabout as you enter the city. We bid the bulls goodbye as we sped off to the airport to catch our flight back to Faial.