Only two weeks ago I returned from a three-week holiday in the Azores. These islands, which are part of Portugal are situated far out in the Atlantic consists of 9 islands. All vary in size and some are more spread out than others. My travel companion and I chose to visit four of the islands: São Miguel, Flores, Pico and Faial. I found the green, lush landscape an amazing place to hiking. Something that catches the eye when you drive along the roads are the long avenues of blue hydrangeas on both sides of the road and up along the crater rims. A magnificent sight not easily forgotten. Even though they had started to bloom.
The hike around the Caldeira was the last hike we did before we left the islands. Faial island is quite small and easy to drive around along the coast in one day. That's what we did. We even had time to make some stops on our way before we drove up to the Caldeira.
The Caldeira is situated in the center of the island. When driving along the coast the interior is dominated by the slopes leading towards the crater rim. We drove up and parked near the starting point to do the 8 kilometer hike along the rim. Because of fog the whole crater was never visible at the same time.
As we walked, the weather changed to become more foggy, but in between it cleared a little to let sunbeams come through. The highest point on the crater is 1043 m. above sea level, which makes it the highest point on the island. If the weather had been clear, we should have been able to see not only the coast, but also the islands of Pico, São Jorge og Craciosa.
Now we are almost back at the starting point. Along the way we have been looking down into the crater which is 400 m in depht. The area at the bottom is protected and it is forbidden to go down. However, we spoke to someone else in the car park who told us that you can go down into the crater if you have a guide. We were satisfied with the trip around the crater. A fairly easy trip that took us approx. 2 1/2 hours. A great walk and a great way to end our visit to the Azores.
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[//]:# (!pinmapple 38.57651 lat -28.70607 long Landscape photography - Caldeira do Faial on the island of Faial, Azores (Portugal) d3scr)
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