lbecker24

I have back problems, so the thought of sitting on a plane for 9 hours on a trip to Barcelona was daunting. I decided to stop on the way, and way back, at the Azores; 9 islands in the middle of the Atlantic owned by Portugal. I decided to stick to one island: Sao Miguel. We explored the western side of the island on the way and stayed in Furnas, on the eastern side, on the way back.
We had an overnight flight, arriving at 6am their time, 2am our time. We grabbed a cab and drove 10 minutes (10 euros) to downtown Ponta Delgada and the Hotel Talisman. The hotel is very large, very old world, with a huge breakfast buffet. We splurged for a suite (140 euros I think?) and I paid for a room for the night before. We collapsed into bed, got up and ate breakfast, then went back to bed till it was time for our tour of the eastern part of the island. I found Lisa Ringleberg ([email protected]) on TripAdvisor. She picked us up in her van and we had a private tour of most of the famous vistas that you see in the guidebooks. The weather was sunny-rainy-cloudy-windy-sunny, which is typical. The most rain we had was at the most famous scene; the blue/green lakes. 10 minutes later, when we stopped for a bite to eat, it was sunny again. The island is a hikers paradise. They say if Hawaii and Ireland had a love child, it would look like Sao Miguel. Just beautiful! Lisa is an ex-Canandian, who has been giving tours for 15 years. She charged us 160 euros for a 6.5 hour private tour. We were very happy to have someone else driving the little narrow windy roads. She told us everything about the islands.
We had dinner at our hotel (steak local style, which is surrounded by a red sauce and topped with hunks of garlic and a fried egg). My husband had chicken and sweet potatoes. The food was delicious. We had ice cream next door at a place called Abracadabra. Lisa told us it was the best ice cream on the island.
The next morning we wandered around downtown Ponta Delgada and had more ice cream before it was time to take our flight to Barcelona, with a 2 hour layover in Lisbon. We flew SATA airlines, which gave us FOOD and lots of it on all our flights.
We flew back to Sao Miguel a week later, this time with a non-stop flight from Barcelona. We were staying at the Furnas Boutique Hotel, in downtown Furnas, which is a 45 minute drive from the PD airport. We arranged to be picked up at the airport via shuttle (it was a taxi) and we drove thru pouring rain to our spa hotel. This place was amazing – a hotel like this would have been $500 in the states. We paid about $140. They had 3 different temperature pools filled with the local hot springs water. They had massages, everyone was wandering around in robes and slippers, the food was fantastic, service was really great. Breakfast was a big buffet with homemade breads. We had a whole day there to wander around and look at the volcanic activity; hot bubbling water, hot springs you could swim in. We ate lunch at Caldeiras & Vulcoes Restaurante, whose specialty was cozido; a stew cooked in boiling volcanic water. I had made a reservation before I got there and I should have ordered myself cozido for one, but I don’t eat much and I was afraid they would present me with a mountain of food. Instead I had pork with volcano potatoes, mashed potatoes stuffed with cheese and chorizo. The restaurant was very nice; my meal was good, not great. After lunch we sat at the pool area in our robes. I went into the various pools/sauna/steam rooms; very relaxing. We ate dinner in the hotel (fish of the day and sweet potatoes).
The next day, after breakfast (the only quibble I have about Furnas Boutique was the small black flies that landed on the breakfast buffet; they had a print out in the room explaining that they are in a forest and therefore bugs are present, but it was not nice to see them on the food), we wandered around the little town, going into the supermarket and the church. We went looking for the other big hotel in town (Terra Nostra Garden Hotel), but we couldn’t find it, which is crazy, considering how small the town is.
We were driven back to the airport by the same driver for our non-stop flight back to Boston. Everyone spoke English except our driver. I wish I had learned how to say “Please slow down, you are driving like a maniac” in Portuguese.
I highly recommend adding the Azores to your list of places to go.

Bedar

So glad you liked the Azores. Since you are in Boston, perhaps you'll return there as a destination rather than as a stopover. Lots to see and such a short flight from Boston. Go in summer. The profusion of flowers will overwhelm you.

lbecker24

Thanks for the tip, Bedar. I was told by our guide that the Azores have been "discovered" and this past summer there was a huge amount of tourists, so many that the vista stops on the tour got overrun with buses. Some stops are just a muddy turn off from the road, with room for 4 little cars. They are going to have to pave paradise and put up a parking lot. Just kidding, but almost not.

We saw plenty of flowers; the hydrangeas might have gone by, but there were those amazing pink lilies; no leaves, just flowers; I've never seen anything like them; gorgeous!