Land Ho: The Azores

A disadvantage of cruises is you have little time to spend in a place—you’re limited to sampling it rather than experiencing it. But, you do quite a bit of sampling.

Our first stop after seven days at sea was the island of  Terceira in the Azores. The Azores are an autonomous region of Portugal. We rented a car to check out one of the larger towns and circumnavigate the island. While driving we noticed many street signs that started with the word “Canada.” At first I thought there might be a large expat community from the Great White North here, but there were so many. Google translate didn’t have a Portuguese equivalent to Canada. But, a little more research revealed that Canada is a Portuguese term for shortcut or small road. 

Fun Azorean Facts:

• There are more cows than people in the Azores. The archipelago provides over half the mile for the country of Portugal. They look rather content.
• People drive Lamborghini tractors here—we saw three of them on the road. They must be rich, right. Actually, Lamborghini made cheap tractors long before he got into the luxury sports car business, which involved a feud with Enzo Ferrari who blew off Ferruccio Lamborghini when he offered him advice about how to better engineer Ferrari clutches. But, we have fun when we travel trying to spot Lamborghini tractors.

Enjoy this Relive video for your own sampling of this gorgeous island that has been inhabited by the Portuguese for more than 500 years. And forgive me if any of the photos are shaky—I have a new phone and am getting used to “live” mode.

As always, feel fee to post questions in the comments section. I have one myself: Why don’t these ships that look so top heavy flip over in heavy seas?