Picturesque Pico pivots from whaling to wine
Centuries-old viniculture helps visitors toast a day of successful sightings
PICO ISLAND, AZORES, PORTUGAL— We’re off in search of blues. Rolling out under a leaden sky, the waves form the track of a roller-coaster under our sturdy zodiac, and my fellow whale watchers — a group of boisterous local guys in their 20s — make the most of the situation, ducking low and twisting with imaginary turns, as if hurtling on a bobsleigh down an Olympic track.
First, we spot the common dolphins, goofing around and swimming upside down, showing us their white bellies. Then it is Risso’s dolphins, bigger and less playful. But it’s a blue whale that we’re really looking to find on our Aqua Acores boat trip.
As big as a 10-storey building laying on its side and weighing some 200 tons, blues can make a school bus look like a toy. With a heart as huge as an automobile and a tongue that weighs as much as an elephant, these massive mammals can nonetheless be rather elusive. But, as we hear a big blow off our starboard side, we all realize, at once, that we just may be in the presence of the largest animal on earth.
It’s just one of many singular moments during my few days on the Azorean island of Pico. Crowned by the cone of a 2,300-metre volcano and the second-largest island in the chain, this beautiful place has nonetheless long suffered an inferiority complex.
Traditionally used as the farm and factory for neighbouring, diminutive Faial, which was historically home to the area’s largest town and its resident, wealthy landowners, Pico’s people still enjoy dark, misty, foggy, rainy days — because, as every single one of them will tell you, with such weather, you can’t see their supposedly conceited neighbours on Faial.
But now, Pico is turning its earthy attributes and rural ways into attractions, bringing in visitors seeking the spectacular, on both land and sea. For example, whales. As I learn at the Whaler’s Museum in the village of Lages ( just steps from where I climbed aboard the zodiac), Pico has a long legacy of whaling — once, two of every three sperm whales harvested across the globe came from the Azores, and the waters off Pico are the most fertile grounds in the archipelago. It was something that continued for decades here after it was eliminated in other parts of the world, and traditional methods persisted, too, with hunters hurling harpoons by hand from open boats, rather than using guns.
“It was a way to be more honest with the whales,” our Aqua Acores whaling captain, Eduardo Sousa tells me later, through a translator. As a former whaler, Sousa can identify a whale from a quick glance at its dorsal fin, and makes scrimshaw from bones harvested long ago.
But today, Pico’s best-known harvest comes from a vine.
UNESCO, which calls the terrain and terroir of this island an “extraordinarily beautiful man-made landscape,” has preserved a 987-hectare section as a World Heritage Site.
With a viniculture dating back to the 15th century (the first vines were planted by Franciscan friars), the people on Pico literally carved out their plots (called “currais”), piling basaltic stones into rock walls to protect their precious plants from the ravages of wind and salty seawater.
“We have a saying on Pico, that life is harder than a rock,” my Tripix Azores guide Rai de Oliveira says as she steers her rough-and-ready jeep toward the vineyards.
A mountain guide (her bread-andbutter is leading two-day hikes to the island’s iconic peak), Oliveira, a transplanted Brazilian married to a local, tells me that wine is almost literally in the blood of people around here, who have worked these plots — hard — for centuries. We walk through the remarkable fields, me snapping photos of the spreading chambers, the vineyards like a vast, black honeycomb.
But, she adds, the people have enjoyed the fruits of their labour, too, building little local day houses by the coast, called “adegas,” places that are passed down within families through the generations.
Walking through a cluster of these tiny, humble houses, Oliveira points out their best features. “Here, we drink,” she says, pointing to a patio table. “And there, a little barbecue.” I do a little drinking, and eating, too. At Cella, a seaside restaurant shaped like a giant wine barrel, I dine on delicious steak, ranched locally, and down a few glasses of the local stuff.
Later, I enjoy a private tasting of rare grapes like arinto dos Acores and terrantes do Pico hosted by Fortunato Duarte Garcia, who also gives me a sip of his famous Czar Vinho Licoroso, a bottle that, in certain vintages, retails for about ¤750.
I also visit the local wine museum, a number of other wineries, as well as the Whaling Industry Museum, where these beasts were hauled up and harvested.
But back on the zodiac, no whales will lose their lives.
Hearing the blow off our starboard side, we trace the big blue whale’s course under the steady gaze of Sousa, who quickly identifies her as a female, around 25 metres long and weighing about 150 tons.
Getting close enough to see her form even below the surface — she seems close enough to touch — we marvel at her enormity, as she makes her way steadily through this North Atlantic way station, from the tropics to the arctic.
While blue whales rarely show their fluke, this one proves the exception to the rule. Tucking into a deep dive, she raises it high, that unmistakable tail waving farewell as she plunges her huge body into the depths of the sea. Tim Johnson was a guest of Turismo dos Açores, which did not review or approve this story.