Azores Post: Day One, The Arrival

Things we have learned

1. Ryan is irritable when he doesn’t get enough sleep.

2. Erin cries and gets overwhelmed when she doesn’t get enough sleep

3. Ryan and Erin should never both not get enough sleep at the same time

4. Driving stick shift is like riding a bike, you never really forget.

5. Driving stick shift in a foreign country is the worst.

6. Parallel parking a stick shift in a foreign country is worse than driving a stick shift in a foreign country.

7. The food here is delicious

8. We love each other

9. We love sleep almost as much as we love each other

10. It’s absolutely gorgeous here!

We landed around 7am but checkin for our hotel/hostel wasn’t until 3 so Ryan and I went to this little cafe and got the local brunch which included local fresh cheeses, breads, jams, melons, and these little cups of hot chocolate stuff and it was amazing!!

We essentially pulled an all nighter and the plan was to explore the city of Ponta Delgada that morning and then sleep when we checked into our accommodations. I don’t think either of us understood how tired we would be though because the city became grating very rapidly so we took the car out of the city and explored.

We drove for a couple hours all along the coast, ate some lunch and eventually got so tired that we found a pull off and took a nap with the windows open and seats down. Sleep has never felt so good.

We were awoken by another car at some point and this guy goes out with this big metal box and starts releasing pigeons one by one. There were about 20 in this really long metal box and we thought that was weird until he brings out ANOTHER box and releases another 20 more pigeons ! Where are all the pigeons coming from man?!?

Here’s what we concluded

1. He rescues injured pigeons and nurses them back to health.

2. He breeds pigeons...because, you know, why not?

3. He’s relocating pigeons from the city

4. He’s training them to be carrier pigeons

5. Or ...We saw them all flying together in a flock about 10 minutes after he left and we think he’s creating a pigeon army...

I’m clearly still exhausted.

We got back to the city and had to try and find a parking spot which resulted in me accidentally leaving Ryan behind without a phone while I’ll drove around the city trying to find my way back. Quite the fiasco.

Finally checked in and this place is amazing! I’ll be writing about our home away from home soon and why it is THE place to stay here. We had dinner with everyone and went to our room to crash. So now it’s bedtime and I have nothing left to say. Looking forward to tomorrow!!!