The highest mountain of Portugal, 2351m high, is on the island of Pico. We could not be so close and not climb it.
The highest mountain of Portugal, 2351m high, is on the island of Pico. We could not be so close and not climb it. We biked back to the harbour of Velas but before taking the boat we left the surf boards by the transport company and found a place to camp for the night.
The weather the last days had been good and it looked like the two upcoming days would be the same — perfect for our trip to the mountain. We got on an early boat to Pico, the sun was already shining and a group of dolphins came and played in the waves behind the boat. The top of Pico was hidden in the clouds.
We were a bit sore from biking and surfing so we agreed to bike as high as we can the first day of arrival. 600m over sea level was enough for that day. A friendly farmer let us camp on his land and offered us local cheese and wine, and the guard dog watched over us that night.
The following day we continued to bike up to Casa de Montanha that is situated 1200m over the sea. It’s where the Pico mountain hiking trail starts. The way up with bikes was fine, not so steep but long, not so much traffic and the weather was really good and we could see the mountain top most part of the trip, which gave us motivation.
We arrived in the evening and to our surprise we needed to pay to climb the mountain. Not so adventurous, we thought.
The ticket office opened at 7am so we thought of the brilliant idea of starting to climb the mountain at 3am in the morning and see the sunrise wake up all the islands around. Said and done, we turned on our head torches and started walking up. It was not that easy, some parts of the trail were really steep and a lot of fog was making it hard to follow the trail signs. It took us three hours to reach the summit.
On top there were two tents from people that went with a known local guide to also see the sunrise. We rushed to the top to be the first and waited for the sun to put its colors on the sky. We were lucky that morning, no clouds covered the view and we could see all the islands around and the whole island of Pico revealing in front of us. The guide came up to us and asked who we came up with.
We told him we just started to climb in the night by ourselves and that we also got here by bike.
He laughed and said that we were real adventurous people and looked down at our worn out vans shoes — “great hiking boots you got,” he said while smiling at us. We hiked down the mountain tired but very pleased that we just climbed the highest mountain of Portugal.
We had some more days left before the flight back to the mainland, more than enough to bike around the island of Pico. I started to feel tired of biking — we had now almost been out for 10 weeks. I had enough of uphills; it was very heavy with a bike trailer. I won’t be biking with a trailer again if not really needed, better to strap bags on your bike cause you will be packing more smart.
Even so, the last days on the island were very nice. We followed the south coast on small gravel roads that lingered through vineyards. The sun was shining and everywhere were natural pools where we could have a refreshing swim. Pico was a really nice island for bikepacking — nice routes with no cars and no extreme ups and downs, except if you bike up to the mountain. It was more a holiday feeling than a wet, windy bike battle.
The time came to face the last hill of the journey. Packed our bikes in the well used bike boxes that barely could make one last boat trip. Has been a good adventure — 4 islands in 10 weeks. I have no clue how many kilometres or altitude we biked and I don’t care either. This was a journey, not a race.
During the time on the bikes we often talked about how nice it would be to live on one of the islands of the Azores. Now, sitting writing this article, we both live on the island of São Miguel.
