Saturday, October 28 – Pont Delgada

Today, we are in Ponta Delgada, another port on another of the Azores.  On the map, we are less than two inches from Horta, but the captain managed to kill more than 12 hours getting here.  Apparently, he “circled the airport” all night.  Although larger than Horta’s island, this one is still a volcanic rock in the middle of the Atlantic.  These islands are, in fact, simply the tops of undersea mountains. 

We can see low hills surrounding the port but no jagged peaks.  Exposed as they are on all sides, they have been worn down by eons of rain and wind.  This does not mean the hills fronting the harbor are not steep – there are stairs instead of sidewalks connecting the streets which parallel the harbor.  Even with the stairs, the climb can be very tiring.

Pont Delgada is Horta all grown up.  It is more of a real city albeit small.  Horta feels more like a village that is still growing.  Most of the buildings exhibit the old local architectural features although there are smaller, more contemporary buildings.  On the other hand, Ponta Delgada has real apartment towers ranging from seven to perhaps 12 stories.  Many of these face the harbor and may serve as vacation condos for European families.

Once again, we were beset by clouds which obscured the hills surrounding town.  At least we escaped any rain while we were here.  This is our third stop here in the past three years and our only plan was to do a little shopping at nearby grocery store.  We discovered this store in 2015 when cruise friends pointed it out to us.  They had found it by accident and were astounded that they could buy Spanish red wine in a juice box package for 1 euro per liter.  We decided to give it a try and bought some, too.

Last year, we decided to purchase some more but could not remember exactly where the store was.  We wandered up and down the main street but could not find it.  Eventually, the salesgirl at a “legitimate” wine shop helped us solve the mystery.  All we had to do was find The Cow and we would be in the right place.  We did and we were.

We have told others, including our dining room steward and Roy, about The Cow.  Once we finished today’s NYT crossword, we gathered a HAL bag from 2015 and headed out.  The cruise terminal here is almost nonexistent, but it leads to an outdoor shopping plaza which consists mostly of bars, cafes and a Burger King.  Free WiFi is the great draw here for crew and passengers alike.  We walked past these distractions and found the elevator up to street level; we found this elevator last year after having climbed the stairs on previous visits.

The Cow [so-named by us because of the life-size ceramic cow on the sidewalk] was practically across the street.  Cars here stop for pedestrians in crosswalks, so we had no trouble getting to the store [However, on the way back, we were almost killed by a cyclist].  Even on a ship with 24-hour food, a snack can hit the spot.  We loaded up on about 15 euros worth of cookies, Pringles and toiletries and retraced our steps.  Mission accomplished.

After we unpacked and stowed our goodies, we went to the Lido for lunch and thence to the Crow’s Nest where MA read while D updated the journal and read.  We stayed until Trivia was over and then went “home” to rest before dinner.

Speaking of dinner…Eka came through last night with the best tempura veggies we have had in three cruises.  We had to wait quite a while as he served all of his other tables, but it was worth the wait.  We are hoping this will become a nightly occurrence.

TOMORROW – More time at sea