There’s evidence of Terceira’s volcanic origins all over the island if you know where to look. On our Azores 38N tour, our guide Gui took us to see fumaroles — a volcano “breathing” — at Terceira National Park. You can see the steam lightly rising on two sides of the photo above.
One of the geologic highlights of Terceira is a dormant volcano that visitors can enter. It sounded great until I read accounts that estimated access required walking about 700 stairs in and out. No doubt interesting but my knees wouldn’t have survived the effort.
From various high spots on the island it’s possible to see multiple volcanic calderas, wide basins of land that remain after a volcano goes extinct.
We traveled a lot of back roads with Gui. Here we were caught in a Terceira traffic jam. I was told there are more cows than people on Terceira.
Yesterday I told you that there are a lot of rock walls on Terceira. Most are used to corral livestock. These above are different. This is a vineyard moving into its winter dormancy and it’s unlike any vineyard I’ve seen before.
While it has a mild Mediterranean climate, Terceira’s address in the Atlantic Ocean means it doesn’t attain the warmth needed to ripen wine grapes. So the vineyard is divided into small rock enclosures. These enclosures absorb solar warmth and then release it to the grapes.
Did I have wine on Terceira? Yes. Was it from the island? {Head slap.} I forgot to ask.
I know that volcanic soil is very fruitful!
So, a cow traffic jam … 😅
That vineyard is very intresting! I’ve never seen anything like that …
I’ve always been fascinated by volcanos and I saw a few fumaroles when I was in Costa Rica. However, after that surprise eruption in New Zealand, I think I’ll forgo any crater tours. What an interesting way to grow grapes. It does make me wonder what impact that has on the wine that is produced.
Gui looks like a happy guide. 🙂 I would have passed on entering the dormant volcano too, way too many stairs.
A creative technique on the vineyards. Terrific shots!
I think I would hesitate about getting near a volcano at least for a little while.
I just finished catching up on your posts about your trip. What a beautiful island and you got some wonderful photos! I loved seeing all of those pretty churches. There were some fumaroles on the little uninhabited island in the middle of the Santorini caldera when my daughter and I were there this past summer. It was my first time learning about them, but I didn’t get any photos.