Flores, Azores

We had a slower day today, the first time in almost a week that we had some down time. I had fallen a few days behind in my blog over this time :( It started with the early flight from Lisbon, the rush to trek up to the caldera in Corvo while the weather was nice, and then unplanned fast boat to Flores. Anyways it was nice to have a relaxing day.

We saw the Atlânticoline ferry come in around 10am. This was the same as the Saturday one that was cancelled due to the high winds. It was small, holding only 16 people. It’s fully enclosed so folks didn’t get wet, but that would also cut down on visibility. When our Saturday ferry was cancelled, I had tried to rebook for today’s (Tuesday) but it was sold out - no wonder, considering it only holds 16.

We got to the Fábrica da Baleia do Boqueirão (Whaling Museum) around 11:15. Google said they closed at noon for lunch but they’re open straight through the day. It cost us 1 EUR each to enter. We had previously seen both the Whalers Museum and the Whaling Industry Museum in Pico which we really liked. The museum here in Flores was a combination of both, housed in a former whaling factory. It was more extensive than I had thought, it took us almost 90 minutes to get through. We really liked it.

We decided to have a big lunch and then just munch on our leftovers for dinner. We ate at the other recommended restaurant in Santa Cruz, O Mergulhador. It was excellent, we liked it better than O Moreão. We split the octopus salad, grilled steak and marrow bone.

We walked around town for a bit after lunch, looking for a souvenir shop, but it was slim pickings.

We checked out the Flores Museum. The history of ship wrecks was interesting, as well as the notable corsairs.

We stopped in at the grocery store to get some fresh buns to make sandwiches for the layover tomorrow. The supply ship (or plane) must have just come in - the fruits and vegetables were fully stocked. We saw the owner from O Moreão stocking up. She recognized us and said hi.

We got back to our bnb around 4:30pm and relaxed the rest of the afternoon. I mostly caught up in my blog. Later we packed up a bit, getting ready for the flight tomorrow. Our suitcases were disorganized after the mad rush to pack and catch the fast boat from Corvo. I had taken a pic of the 7.9kg contents of the carry-on suitcase so we could repack it. Heather’s cottonballs were now in her big suitcase so I swapped in her gloves. Hopefully that won’t push it over.