Raging Bull?

In the Azores, bull fights take on a new interpretation. 

Bulls are brought out into the streets of the towns and the locals (after a few beers) will run up to the bull, taunt it, and then promptly be smashed by the bull! The locals take great joy in trying to cheat death as they run for their lives from a raging bull. They will taunt the bull with umbrellas to try and make the bull charge away from their bodies, but an angry bull is much smarter than a drunk human, and the bull usually knocks the drunk for a loop! 

I began to wonder, are the bull here always like this? Or are they only irritated by the constant taunting from the drunk locals? 

While hiking around, Maddie and I came across a field full of cows and one particularly large cow right by the low stone wall. We looked at each other and pet its head. It looked at us for a while as we smiled back, then it picked its nose with its tongue. 

We didn’t realize the situation we were in until the large cow walked away from the wall and revealed to us that it was in fact a bull!  

The bulls here are just as kind as the cows, and just like us, they don’t like to be taunted. If you do taunt the bulls, they are strong and will send you flying up into the sky before they fling your lifeless body into a stone wall!  

If you ever get bored, you should check out the Azores Bull Fight videos on YouTube (no bulls are injured in the fights, only the local humans). After the bull fights, the bulls go home to their field where they continue being a bull and grazing in the pastures. 

Heart Shaped Falls

One of the waterfalls on Flores had two falls that became one. As they cascaded down the cliff face, the white foaming water somewhat resembles a heart! 

Do you see it?  

The tip of the heart then pours its contents into the lake below which shortly thereafter drains into the ocean. 

Being so close to the beauty of nature makes you feel so removed from all the excuses that people list as to why they are unhappy. Happiness doesn’t come from material posessions; no, it comes from experiences! 

Flores Paths

The island of Flores seems to have more cows than people, and the majority of the island seems to be covered by fields instead of buildings. In these fields, there are no roads, but instead neat little walkways. Some are stone, some are red volcanic pebbles, some are grass. They will work their way through the fields and along old field houses that are in varying levels of condition. 

When you walk back through these fields, you will stumble across majestic views that your car could never reach! You will find streams, waterfalls, and forests that have grown around lakes that are deeper into the island. 

This one path follows a river up to the cliff where a thin and wispy waterfall coats the sides of the rocks with a thin mist.

Lava Breakwater

We spent a considerable amount of time in Terceira where all the breakwaters are man-made. Terceira is a rather old island, so the wind and waves have had about three million years to wear the volcanic rock away, thus necessitating the construction of man-made structures to protect the harbors and shores from the punishing onslaught of the waves. 

Flores, is about a million years younger than Terceira, and it shows! The volcanic rocks on the shore are very jagged and do just fine destroying the waves and dissipating their energy without the aid of mankind. 

Maddie and I often wonder if the locals look up at the magnificent cliffs and waterfalls as often as we do! To think that this view can be found right next to the public boat ramp!  

So much splendor in such a small space. 

Altered Reality

Camera phones are impressive machines. I came to the realization that my smart phone is the “do it all gadget” from older sci-fi movies. It has a flashlight, location information, maps, camera, voice recorder, video recorder, encyclopedia, and it can make phone calls too! 

The panoramic feature is fun to play with. It will compile a series of photographs into one long and wide photograph. Much like a multiple exposure photograph from the days of film cameras, the digital camera in the phone will stitch together multiple photos to create a panoramic image. But what if the image changes while the panoramic image is being taken? 

It gives a pretty cool effect! Maddie started taking the panoramic image with me standing on the left, and as she panned right, I moved along for the show. It gives a pretty cool rendering of the future that we once invisioned we would be living. We don’t have flying cars or immortality, but we do have Batman’s utility belt in the palm of our hands.