So the cauliflower did its bit last night, and delicious it was too. Sue is wondering what to put in her backpack instead, for the journey back!

Today we had breakfast, got in the car and headed off south to the island's only viable harbour at Lajes, to find lots of yachts at anchor, rolling about, and one tied up to the harbour wall, rolling about, and loads of works going on in the harbour to create Flores' first viable marina. The photo shows this. Work is well advanced, and next season possibly yachts will be able to come in and tie up to a pontoon!

The flowers on this island live up to its name. Hedges between fields are of hydrangeas, and every village has a riot of colourful blooms to delight the passer-by. We headed north, and made about the same time on the journey as the Corvo ferry, which we had watched being loaded in Lajes harbour, and which left there aqt the same time as we did. The reason is the zig zag nature of the road north on the east side of the island, past the dramatic airport with its airstrip which is really quite short, and built with steep cliffs at each end! The cliffs are what you see if you look out of the plane window on the approach, and for all the world it is as thoughnthe plane is about to dive into a cliff! Corvo is the other westerly Azorean island, difficult to reach, and quite lovely.

At the north end of the island we descended into Ponto Delgada, where Helen and Mike from Island Drifter had recommended a fish restaurant, O Pescador, and we decided to try it out for lunch. It was superb! We had grilled limpets for starters, Sue had grilled prawns, then we all had parrot fish, which was lightly fried in batter and served with tomato and boiled potatoes. It was great, although we had to be careful with the bones. Then we headed south across the island and took in some of its volcanic craters, or caldeiras, most of which have water in them, but all of which are spectacular. We took lots of photos today, and I will attempt to put them in a gallery so have a look once you have read this. I'll call it Flores.

Dinner was the picnic lunch we were going to have until we decided on the restaurant, and we ate it at the picnic table in the garden of our old house here. We watched the shimmering seas in the evening sunshine, and we were visited in turn by a cockerel and two herns, he splendid and just like the totemic Portuguese cockerel on all the tea towels and bottle stoppers (thank you Bev!) then by a donkey, to whom we gave bits of apple and finally a whole apple, which he just loved!

Tonight we are packing up prior to heading for the airport tomorrow for our return to Sao Miguel, where we know our friends on Andromeda have already arrived. Hopefully rhe plane will fly, and hopefully we will leave on it.........