Heroina do Mar, from Noble People, Brave and Immortal City
Sensors
Pattern on top of Monte Brasil, overlooking Angra do Heroísmo.
urban art and life
Passersby pass in front of a facade decorated with street art from the city.
Prainha and Historic Center
Lines and colors of the coastline of the historic center of Angra do Heroísmo.
Camões' Steps
Monument statue to Luís de Camões, on a crosswalk of his own verses.
Misericórdia Facade and the Obelisk
The yellow of Alto da Memória in contrast to the blue of the Igreja da Misericórdia.
Coat of Arms 5 Corners
Ilhéu das Cabras
View from Monte Brasil, with the Ilhéu das Cabras in the distance.
Jardim Duque da Terceira and Casario
Secular house of Angra do Heroísmo, as seen from the top of Alto da Memória.
Third party architecture
Twin towers of a church above all the roofs of Angra do Heroísmo.
Fountain "Fonte Nova"
Passersby skirt a modernist fountain installed next to the Igreja da Misericórdia.
Portuguese roofs
The harmonious houses that contributed for UNESCO to declare Angra do Heroísmo World Heritage.
starry terrace
Artistic sidewalks and trees make a kiosk-esplanade in the city more seductive.
Marina crowded
The quiet marina but close to the pine cone of Angra do Heroísmo.
Hiking
Passersby walk along a walled slope near the Igreja da Misericórdia.
The Obelisk of Memory
Painting works on the Memory obelisk.
World Heritage Slope
An elegant and sloping street in the capital of Terceira island, Angra do Heroísmo.
Stained Glass vs Eaves
The city is partly seen with elegant stained glass shades.
Angra do Heroísmo is much more than the historic capital of the Azores, Terceira Island and, on two occasions, Portugal. 1500km from the mainland, it gained a leading role in Portuguese nationality and independence that few other cities can boast.
Text: Marco C. Pereira
Images: Marco C. Pereira-Sara Wong
The time has passed.
With it, the life of the yellow-brown of the obelisk at Alto da Memória was gone. Aware of the importance of the place and the monument, for Angra do Heroísmo and for Portugal, the authorities remember to restore its shine.
When we reach the top of the lawn, five painters, armed with stairs, repeat careful brushstrokes.
Embossed lines and edges abound so the job requires both skill and patience.
To the north and inland of the island, the sky provided a dense white background.
In the opposite direction, over the sheltered cove to the south, the city rejected the cloudiness. It was warming under the successive streaks of the still vigorous September sun.
The walled threshold of the hill offers us a view of the houses of Angra, from that angle, above all clay roofs, as Portuguese as possible. Not only.
Just below it was a vegetable garden dotted with palm trees, with a hint of tropical that the adjoining Jardim Duque da Terceira was thickening.
To the east and west, surrounding this luxuriant Eden, two magnificent houses of God appeared, the façade and the twin towers of the church of Nossa Senhora de Carmo in a duel of secular architectural reverence with those of Nossa Senhora da Guia.
Other churches, other towers, numerous manor houses, palaces, palatial buildings and rows of buildings are repeated up to the Gaspar Corte-Real and Pêro de Barcelos roads, to Prainha and Marina d'Angra, now over the Atlantic.
They form a harmonious city, the result of half a millennium of orthogonal planning, more than that, resplendent with a prosperity and ostentation that clerical omnipresence has contributed to uniform.
Today, here and there, enriched with works of street art that leave no one indifferent.
The Foundation and Exemplary Urbanization of Angra do Heroísmo
Since at least 1474, the settlers of the metropolis strive to improve their refuge in the North Atlantic.
Álvaro Martins Homem and João Vaz Corte-Real, the first Donatorial Captains of Angra, took great care and set an example. After four years, Angra became the village. Sixty years later, it became the first town in the Azores to rise to the city.
The vigor of local Christianity followed that of urbanism. In that same year of 1534, Pope Paul III issued the bull aequum reputamus and decreed the Diocese of Angra, with religious jurisdiction over the other Azorean islands. Thus, one can better understand the profusion of churches, cathedrals, Empires of the Divine, chapels and the like.
The devotion that the people of the city and the Terceira island they preserve for God and that, as a result of the Azorean diaspora, they contributed to globalizing.
The Deserved World Heritage City Statute
After twenty minutes of contemplation and wonder, we descend to the seaside of the Angrense land, to the elegant streets of the historic center which, accordingly, UNESCO declared, in 1983, World Heritage.
We walk around the Palácio dos Capitães Generales, which the Jesuits built as a College with a Study Courtyard, but which, in 1776, shortly after the expulsion of the order from Iberia, the first Captain-General of the Azores, D. Antão de Almada, appeased and adjusted for administrative and military purposes.
It would serve as the Royal Palace, on two separate occasions.
From Paço to Paço, we descend to the ones in the Municipality, overlooking Praça Velha and the standardized black and white pavement, which there is made of human chess.
In a movement characteristic of a queen, we proceed down Rua Direita, in search of another emblematic church in Angra, Misericórdia, the city's overcrowded Marina and its favorite bathing bay, Prainha.
Basílio Simões Store: Picturesque Legacy of the Commercial History of Angra do Heroísmo
Along the way, we noticed the facade of the Basílio Simões store, listed online as a supermarket, but in which we identified a mix of guild and grocery store.
The interior, organic, made of wood, glass shelves, cardboard boxes serving as additional displays.
A display of planting seeds, tools, linoleum, feed, fertilizer and related field products forms a profitable assortment.
Right next door, the business justifies a kind of antique office, equipped with an old safe, shelves, desks and chairs, each piece more ancient and well preserved than the next, like most of the owners and employees of the family business.
The strong commercial tradition of Angra do Heroísmo dates back a long time. It's at the base of your bonanza.
Angra do Heroísmo: the last stopover in the India and Hispanic Route of the Americas
Closer and simpler exchanges aside, Angra was the ultimate stop of the Indian Career. It welcomed, repaired and supplied ships that departed from the west coast of africa to be made around the Sea and, at the same time, to avoid the attacks of the Moorish pirates, later, of the rival European nations.
With the advent of the Philippine Dynasty, the Portuguese ships were joined by the Spanish galleons, coming from Cartagena de Indias quality Puerto Rico, full of gold, silver and many other treasures taken from the Americas.
All this maritime traffic and the wealth that sailed with it even justified the creation of a dedicated institution, the Armed Office, complemented by naval shipyards and the various fortresses and fortifications that continue to defend the city.
One of these shipyards occupied the area of the current Prainha, today, a kind of rounded marine swimming pool in which residents and outsiders bathe and delight, which they use and on the walls above as an outdoor gym – provided that capricious weather allows it – delivered to naked torso exercises.
Monte Brasil: an Extinct and Hyperfortified Volcano
From Prainha, we head for what would have been the most important fortification in Angra, detached into the Atlantic on the Monte Brasil promontory, in a favorable position for attacking the attacking ships with artillery.
At the top of this extinct volcano, we have a perspective on the city opposite to Alto da Memória. We also find the Fortress of São João Baptista (Castelo de São Filipe), the Fort of São Sebastião and other walls and bastions.
They were erected and reinforced by the Spaniards, fed up with pirates and privateers, aware that, by themselves, the blessings of the Ermida de Santo António and Igreja da Misericórdia would not exorcise such demons.
A red, blue, gold coat of arms of Portugal, detached from the façade of the Igreja da Misericórdia, sparkles with patriotism.
It is just one of the countless elements of Portuguese nationality disseminated by Angra, symbols of loyalty to the Crown and, later, to the Republic that history was responsible for recording.
They used Angra do Heroísmo and Terceira, but only as far and when they could. Once the ideal context arrived, the Angrense continued to support the Prior of Crato who, from 1580 to 1582, had settled there and to his provisional government.
Angra's Contribution to the Restoration of Independence and the Liberal Triumph of 1834
From March 16, 1642, they rebelled, triumphed over the Castilians and expelled them from the island. The abnegation and sacrifice of the Angrenses caused D. João IV to grant Angra the title of “Very Noble and Loyal City".
Once independence was restored, Portuguese history quickly put the city to the test again.
Between 1828 and 1834, the Liberal Wars took over the metropolis. Angra assumed the logistical fulcrum of the Liberal Forces and hosted the Provisional Board, on behalf of Queen Maria II. From the capital of the Azores, it was promoted to the capital of the Kingdom.
In the meantime, D. Pedro IV took the Azores. made of Terceira island its headquarters and there prepared a naval and military force to the height of the conflict.
From Angra he sailed to the north of Portugal.
On the 8th of July 1832, he carried out the Landing of Mindelo from where he reorganized to take Porto and, having surpassed the Cerco dos Miguelists, the rest of the country, after sailing to the Algarves and, from the Algarves towards Lisbon, in such an unusual plan and guarded by an English fleet that the Miguelistas were never able to stop it.
In this place on Praia dos Ladrões, where the Liberals landed, the memorial to the victims of the Civil War, in the shape of an obelisk, still stands today. With an unworthy name for its importance, the northern beach was renamed Praia da Memória.
Since then, Portuguese identity and nationality have continued to twitch. Portugal went from monarchy to republic, from dictatorship to democracy.
Whatever the next meanders, the Angrenses will always and forever celebrate their protagonism.
Between 1845 and 1856, they erected the so-called “mirror” obelisk at Alto da Memória. When we got back there at the end of the day, they continued to paint and revive the illustrious history of Angra do Heroísmo.
It was called the Island of Jesus Christ and has radiated, for a long time, the cult of the Holy Spirit. It houses Angra do Heroísmo, the oldest and most splendid city in the archipelago. These are just two examples. The attributes that make Terceira island unique are endless.
By a mere volcanic whim, the youngest Azorean patch projects itself into the rock and lava apogee of Portuguese territory. The island of Pico is home to its highest and sharpest mountain. But not only. It is a testament to the resilience and ingenuity of the Azoreans who tamed this stunning island and surrounding ocean.
An immaculate biosphere that the Earth's entrails mold and soften is displayed, in São Miguel, in a panoramic format. São Miguel is the largest of the Portuguese islands. And it is a work of art of Nature and Man in the middle of the North Atlantic planted.
It was the first in the archipelago to emerge from the bottom of the sea, the first to be discovered, the first and only to receive Cristovão Colombo and a Concorde. These are some of the attributes that make Santa Maria special. When we visit it, we find many more.
Where, to the west, even on the map the Americas appear remote, the Ilha das Flores is home to the ultimate Azorean idyllic-dramatic domain and almost four thousand Florians surrendered to the dazzling end-of-the-world that welcomed them.
The world community of sailors is well aware of the relief and happiness of seeing the Pico Mountain, and then Faial and the welcoming of Horta Bay and Peter Café Sport. The rejoicing does not stop there. In and around the city, there are white houses and a green and volcanic outpouring that dazzles those who have come so far.
From one coast of the island to the opposite one, through the mists, patches of pasture and forests typical of the Azores, we discover Faial and the Mystery of its most unpredictable volcano.
Finally, we will disembark in Graciosa, our ninth island in the Azores. Even if less dramatic and verdant than its neighbors, Graciosa preserves an Atlantic charm that is its own. Those who have the privilege of living it, take from this island of the central group an esteem that remains forever.
17 km2 of a volcano sunk in a verdant caldera. A solitary village based on a fajã. Four hundred and thirty souls snuggled by the smallness of their land and the glimpse of their neighbor Flowers. Welcome to the most fearless of the Azorean islands.
In the Azores, strips of habitable land at the foot of large cliffs abound. No other island has as many fajãs as the more than 70 in the slender and elevated São Jorge. It was in them that the jorgenses settled. Their busy Atlantic lives rest on them.
We were surprised, on the biggest island of the Azores, with a caldera cut by small farms, massive and deep to the point of sheltering two volcanoes, a huge lagoon and almost two thousand people from São Miguel. Few places in the archipelago are, at the same time, as grand and welcoming as the green and steaming Vale das Furnas.
As a rule, whoever arrives at Pico disembarks on its western side, with the volcano (2351m) blocking the view on the opposite side. Behind Pico Mountain, there is a whole long and dazzling “east” of the island that takes time to unravel.
We arrived at (i) the eminence of Galicia, at an altitude of 1000m and even more. Castro Laboreiro and the surrounding villages stand out against the granite monumentality of the mountains and the Planalto da Peneda and Laboreiro. As do its resilient people who, sometimes handed over to Brandas and sometimes to Inverneiras, still call these stunning places home.
We leave the cliffs of Srª da Peneda, heading for Arcos de ValdeVez and the villages that an erroneous imaginary dubbed Little Portuguese Tibet. From these terraced villages, we pass by others famous for guarding, as golden and sacred treasures, the ears they harvest. Whimsical, the route reveals the resplendent nature and green fertility of these lands in Peneda-Gerês.
We continue on a long, zigzag tour through the domains of Peneda-Gerês and Bouro, inside and outside our only National Park. In this one of the most worshiped areas in the north of Portugal.
we moved from Terras de Bouro for those of Barroso. Based in Montalegre, we wander around the discovery of Paredes do Rio, Tourém, Pitões das Júnias and its monastery, stunning villages on the border of Portugal. If it is true that Barroso has had more inhabitants, visitors should not miss it.
Discovered during a stormy sea tour, Porto Santo remains a providential shelter. Countless planes that the weather diverts from neighboring Madeira guarantee their landing there. As thousands of vacationers do every year, they surrender to the softness and immensity of the golden beach and the exuberance of the volcanic sceneries.
The journey begins with a resplendent dawn at 1818 m, high above the sea of clouds that snuggles the Atlantic. This is followed by a winding, ups and downs walk that ends on the lush insular summit of Pico Ruivo, 1861 meters away.
Curve after curve, tunnel after tunnel, we arrive at the sunny and festive south of Paul do Mar. We get goosebumps with the descent to the vertiginous retreat of Achadas da Cruz. We ascend again and marvel at the final cape of Ponta do Pargo. All this, in the western reaches of Madeira.
In its northeast corner, Porto Santo is another thing. With its back facing south and its large beach, we unveil a mountainous, rugged and even wooded coastline, dotted with islets that dot an even bluer Atlantic.
The Portuguese founded Gurué in the 1930th century and, from XNUMX onwards, flooded it with camellia sinensis the foothills of the Namuli Mountains. Later, they renamed it Vila Junqueiro, in honor of its main promoter. With the independence of Mozambique and the civil war, the town regressed. It continues to stand out for the lush green imposing mountains and teak landscapes.
Discovering the Western Visayas archipelago, we set aside a day to travel from Iloilo along the northwest coast of Guimaras. The beach tour along one of the Philippines’ countless pristine coastlines ends on the stunning Ave Maria Island.
Gorongosa was home to one of the most exuberant ecosystems in Africa, but from 1980 to 1992 it succumbed to the Civil War waged between FRELIMO and RENAMO. Greg Carr, Voice Mail's millionaire inventor received a message from the Mozambican ambassador to the UN challenging him to support Mozambique. For the good of the country and humanity, Carr pledged to resurrect the stunning national park that the Portuguese colonial government had created there.
On the way up to the Ghyaru village, we had a first and unexpected show of how ecstatic the Annapurna Circuit can be tasted. Nine kilometers later, in Braga, due to the need to acclimatize, we climbed from 3.470m from Braga to 4.600m from Lake Kicho Tal. We only felt some expected tiredness and the increase in the wonder of the Annapurna Mountains.
By itself, Lanzarote would always be a Canaria by itself, but it is almost impossible to explore it without discovering the restless and activist genius of one of its prodigal sons. César Manrique passed away nearly thirty years ago. The prolific work he left shines on the lava of the volcanic island that saw him born.
In 1955, pilot Harry Wigley created a system for taking off and landing on asphalt or snow. Since then, his company has unveiled, from the air, some of the greatest scenery in Oceania.
At Pentecost, in their late teens, young people launch themselves from a tower with only lianas tied to their ankles. Bungee cords and harnesses are inappropriate fussiness from initiation to adulthood.
The Danes founded Charlotte Amalie in 1666, and soon thereafter, beer halls abounded there. The town prospered until successive tragedies and the abolition of slavery condemned it to decline. In the early XNUMXth century, the United States acquired the Danish West Indies. Charlotte Amalie evolved into a busy cruise port.
The law of supply and demand dictates their proliferation. Generic or specific, covered or open air, these spaces dedicated to buying, selling and exchanging are expressions of life and financial health.
From the beginning of the XNUMXth century, with Hispanic settlers and, more recently, with Portuguese emigrants, customs and traditions well known in the Iberian Peninsula and, in particular, in northern Portugal, were consolidated in the Pueblos del Sur.
It's in our genes. For the pleasure of participating, for titles, honor or money, competitions give meaning to the world. Some are more eccentric than others.
In 1956, skeptical Taiwanese doubted that the initial 20km of Central Cross-Island Hwy was possible. The marble canyon that challenged it is today the most remarkable natural setting in Formosa.
In 1565, the Hindu empire of Vijayanagar succumbed to enemy attacks. 45 years before, he had already been the victim of the Portugueseization of his name by two Portuguese adventurers who revealed him to the West.
A French colonist settled on the flooded banks of the Atchafalaya River, when it was still under alternating French and Spanish control. In Franklin, we are impressed by the historical and architectural heritage created by the owners of sugar cane plantations and the slaves who worked them.
Cilaos appears in one of the old green boilers on the island of Réunion. It was initially inhabited by outlaw slaves who believed they were safe at that end of the world. Once made accessible, nor did the remote location of the crater prevent the shelter of a village that is now peculiar and flattered.
West of Mount Sokosti (718m) and the immense Urho Kekkonen National Park, Saariselkä has developed as a nature escape hub. Having arrived from Ivalo, it is there that we set up base for a series of new experiences and adventures. Some 250 freezing km north of the Arctic Circle.
In 1993, frustrated by the Portuguese government's disregard for his work “The Gospel According to Jesus Christ”, Saramago moved with his wife Pilar del Río to Lanzarote. Back on this somewhat extraterrestrial Canary Island, we visited his home. And the refuge from the portuguese censorship that haunted the writer.
The Colorado River and tributaries began flowing into the plateau of the same name 17 million years ago and exposed half of Earth's geological past. They also carved one of its most stunning entrails.
Heiress of the Soviet civilization, aligned with the great Russia, Armenia allows itself to be seduced by the most democratic and sophisticated ways of Western Europe. In recent times, the two worlds have collided in the streets of your capital. From popular and political dispute, Yerevan will dictate the new course of the nation.
A lithic vastness emerges from the cerrado around Pirenópolis and the heart of the Brazilian state of Goiás. With almost 600 hectares and even more millions of years old, it brings together countless capricious and labyrinthine ruiniform formations. Anyone who visits it will be lost in wonder.
The prominent city of Goa already justified the title of “rome of the east” when, in the middle of the XNUMXth century, epidemics of malaria and cholera led to its abandonment. The New Goa (Pangim) for which it was exchanged became the administrative seat of Portuguese India but was annexed by the Indian Union of post-independence. In both, time and neglect are ailments that now make the Portuguese colonial legacy wither.
Effusive as ever, Ernest Hemingway called Key West "the best place I've ever been...". In the tropical depths of the contiguous US, he found evasion and crazy, drunken fun. And the inspiration to write with intensity to match.
A substantial part of Fiji preserves the agricultural expansions of the British colonial era. In the north and off the large island of Viti Levu, we also came across plantations that have only been named for a long time.
In few places in the world a dialect is used as vehemently as in the monastery of Sera. There, hundreds of monks, in Tibetan, engage in intense and raucous debates about the teachings of the Buddha.
We depart Fianarantsoa at 7a.m. It wasn't until 3am the following morning that we completed the 170km to Manakara. The natives call this almost secular train Train Great Vibrations. During the long journey, we felt, very strongly, those of the heart of Madagascar.
At 1.2 km, the oldest and longest wooden bridge in the world allows the Burmese of Amarapura to experience Lake Taungthaman. But 160 years after its construction, U Bein is in its twilight.
At the end of the 11th century, Mariano Lacson, a Filipino farmer, and Maria Braga, a Portuguese woman from Macau, fell in love and got married. During the pregnancy of what would be her 2th child, Maria succumbed to a fall. Destroyed, Mariano built a mansion in his honor. In the midst of World War II, the mansion was set on fire, but the elegant ruins that endured perpetuate their tragic relationship.
Impenetrable rainforests and mangroves fill Iriomote under a pressure cooker climate. Here, foreign visitors are as rare as the yamaneko, an elusive endemic lynx.
Kauai is the greenest and rainiest island in the Hawaiian archipelago. It is also the oldest. As we explore its Napalo Coast by land, sea and air, we are amazed to see how the passage of millennia has only favored it.
