On our trip around the Azores we'd planned three nights in Faial, mostly because I was fascinated with the view it had of neighboring Pico and its mountain, but we soon realized that it was a beautiful island in its own right.

On our first day there we drove over to Almoxarife, a small village on the coast on the other side of a headland from the capital Horta. It's a reall pretty little town and we spent a large part of the afternoon diving into the sea from the concrete piers with the the locals.  The beaches here are all pretty steep and rocky, and there's something incredibly enjoyable about leaping into the ocean like that.  The water in the Azores is much warmer than in mainland Portugal and in such a hot and humid place it was great to jump in.