Back to Dear old Blighty!

I've just returned from a wonderful week in The Azores. I will try to stay on the topic of growing fruit and vegetables but please excuse me for going off topic for a while. As you can see I have been watching whales.

Many different speces of whales and dolphins swim in the waters around the Azores. The ones we spotted here are sperm whales, we approached and switched the boat engine off and they just glide right past the boat, then after about 10 minutes they reward us with a deep dive, affording us the chance to take the classic 'whale tail' photograph.

We also visited a pineapple plantation on the island of Sao Miguel, these wooden glasshouses are past their best, and sadly the majority of them have disappeared and the land sold to build new houses. I will blog on 'how to grow pineapples' at a later date.

The temperature inside these glasshouses was a bit hotter than your average sauna!

One of the most famous views on the island is over the two lakes of the volcanic crater at Sete Cidades. One lake is green and one is blue, the distance from one side of the crater to the other is about 8 miles!

Lots of common dolphins too!

And Europe's only tea plantation - there was a small factory rolling, drying and packing the tea. I have yet to taste the packet that I bought there - apparently it is awful!!!