Touring Terceira

I'm thinking I really should have posted every day about this last week... now I probably won't remember everything that we did, and this will possibly be my longest post yet. Oh well. I'll try, anyway. Friday morning, I took Mom and Dad to the kids' school, so they could chaperone Price and Josh's field trip to Angra do Heroismo. This is the biggest city on the island, with about 25,000 people. They got to tour the museum and the gardens, as well as supervise a whole bunch of 4th and 5th graders. The above photo is from our trip to the beach after school. It was a gorgeous day, so we got the kids into swimsuits and headed for our neighborhood swimming hole. The water isn't exactly warm yet, but it's getting there, and the sun was warm enough to compensate. The best part was the little girl who was there "saving" jellyfish. May here is apparently jellyfish season, because they were everywhere- not so much where the kids were swimming, but a little farther out, toward the ocean. Every time a wave came in, this girl would take her bucket, full of water, and go to find all the jellies that had been washed onto the shore. She would very carefully pick each jelly up by the back of its body, avoiding the tentacles, and put it into her bucket. She told us that she was doing it because she likes jellyfish, and she would dump them back into the water when there weren't so many people around.


Saturday morning, we woke up and got ready bright and early to go to our friend Rachel's baptism. It was on the opposite side of the island, so we drove for a while until we got to Quatro Ribeiras. We'd never been to this particular swimming hole before, and we were so glad we got to go! In the first place, it was an absolutely gorgeous spot, with waterfalls, an old mill with cool millstones, and a really amazing swimming area- lots of big rocks, cliffs, and stairs, all connected by cement. It was a place that would have been totally inaccessible, made accessible by the intervention of man. Probably never would have happened in the States... but we were glad it was there! Also, the baptism was amazing- this was not like the other ocean baptism I have attended... no sand bottom and gently rolling waves for us. No, our friend Jed had to struggle for balance on the rocks in pretty deep, rough water... and this was after he stepped into the ocean and went underwater himself. He did manage not to let go of Rachel, though, so everything was good.



When the baptism was done, we drove up through the middle of the island, back towards home. We had planned to do a hike that we've done before, but the fog was so thick up there that we wouldn't have seen anything. Instead, we tried another one. It was a pretty easy hike, about 5 kilometers long. For part of the trail, we were following wheel ruts in the rock, some of which were created before 1820. I can't even imagine driving a donkey cart over the terrain we were walking. Pretty crazy.


Sunday, Mom and Dad got to attend church in our tiny branch- Mom even came to nursery with me. It's more fun when there is another adult to talk to! That evening, we drove to the top of Serra do Cume, a high ridge which kind of divides the coastal region of Praia from the farming interior (literally the interior of a caldera). The road at the top was closed for construction, so we took a walk around the loop. Annie had a good time looking through the binoculars.


Monday morning, we were all very excited for the long-awaited dolphin watching trip. You had to be 5 or older to go, so we left Annie with Karla for the morning. The older kids, Tim and Mom had a great time on the trip. There was beautiful scenery, fun waves to get splashed by, and Portuguese Man-O-Wars and birds to watch. There were, however, no dolphins. We were out for over 3 hours and didn't even see a fin. The rest of us didn't care much about the lack of marine life... we were more interested in getting back to the port and off of the boat. Ethan threw up 4 times, Emma once, and Dad and I just wished we could. Too much information, I know. Oh well, at least we can say we've done it now, and I know not to get back on a boat ...ever again... for the rest of my life!

That evening, after our stomachs had settled a bit, the adults set out for a restaurant that we'd heard about from a few people- "Os Moinhos", or "The Mill". It is literally made out of an old stone mill, and had tons of ambience. The food was pretty good, too, but very salty. That's pretty typical, but still a little annoying. While we were waiting for the place to open, we walked around Sao Sebastiao. The above picture is the spirit house there.


Tuesday we drove into Praia. It is the second biggest town, and has the only long stretch of sandy beach on the island. We did a little shopping, saw the old church (built in the 14-1500's!), and drove up to the statue of Mary that overlooks the port there. After school was out, we drove up into the middle of the island, toured the cave and the fumaroles that remind us we live on a volcano, and saw the BIG, black, mean-looking bulls that live up there. These are former bullfight contestants. Here, they don't kill the bull after the fight, but honor it by putting it out to pasture for the rest of its life. I don't think I'll be hopping the wall any time soon.


Sorry for the very long travelogue. To sum it up, we have had a great time with Mom and Dad, and are not anxious for them to go home on Friday. It's a good thing we're coming home soon, or we'd be really sad to see them leave!