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Where Europe Ends
Europe ends here: 38° North, 30° West, about 800 nautical miles from the nearest coast, in the middle of the Atlantic.
Isolated for centuries, the Azoreans learned to get by, living from farming, fishing and… whaling. It was from these stories that Herman Melville took ideas for Moby Dick.
Today nobody touches cetaceans in the Azores, but the shadow of the sperm whale still hangs around, and the old whalers’ eyes still drift out to sea.
The south coast of Pico Island, where sperm whales like to be, is one of the best places in the world to see them. From up at the Vigia da Queimada lookout, Luís and Paulo tell us where they are.
We don’t only show whales. We also show the whaling culture of Lajes, where the last whalers were the first to take people out to see whales. Some of them are still here to tell you what it was like to go from harpoon to camera.
Watching whales with respect for the animals and for the people who live here is the natural continuation of this story. Hunting ended in 1984, but Lajes still lives from whales, living ones now. It’s better for them, and for the village too.
The Call of the Ocean
No two days at sea are the same. Some mornings the ocean is a mirror and, half an hour later, there are blows, breaches and dolphins at the bow. And there are days when we wait longer than we’d like: the sea doesn’t deliver to order.
That’s what makes it good: nothing is guaranteed.
When to Visit
We go out to sea from mid-March to the end of October. The rest of the year, the Atlantic keeps the sea to itself.
- Spring (March–May): the great migratory whales pass by, blue, fin and sei whales, on their way north.
- Summer (June–August): the season of resident species, sperm whales, bottlenose and spotted dolphins, often with calves. Also the season with the most boats at sea.
- Autumn (September–October): often calm seas, beautiful light and fewer people. A good time for anyone who doesn’t like crowds.
Whatever the season, we don’t promise a show. We promise to go out carefully, and the rest is up to them.
