- One of those places that you don't know
if you're still in planet Earth or you are in Mars.
- I think you're not in Mars. I think you're in Heaven.
(upbeat music)
- We go to Azores.
(upbeat music continues)
- Bem-vindo!
(upbeat music continues)
- [Host] Okay, so what you see here is an abandoned hotel,
Monte Palace.
This was a hotel built in the early eighties
when Azores was not a popular location for tourism.
It lasted less than 18 months and then it went bankrupt.
They closed it.
So one of the interesting things I heard,
they used to pay a guard, he had a dog
and they were sort of taking care of this place for very,
very long time, and then they ran out of money.
Now anyone can enter.
You know, it's easy to speak now
because we know what actually happened here.
It was probably a big mistake to invest and build this hotel
in the late eighties,
if I'm not wrong it was in 1989
because the Azores were not really a big thing
in the tourism industry and also this location,
it's quite remote.
Imagine, you're a guest, you come here,
what do you really do?
Just sit in your balcony,
drink something and that's it pretty much.
Then you need to drive.
Not a lot of things going on around.
Have to be honest, it feels very strange
to be here seeing abandoned rooms.
Some of these rooms even have the original carpet.
It feels terrifying.
You don't need to pay for this.
It's open for everyone. Well actually it's not open.
It says it's private property, but on the other hand,
I see everyone going.
I have to say, this is very well structured.
You come to a place, they call it "Miradouro" (viewpoint)
and you walk 15 minutes, another viewpoint
another 15 minutes, another viewpoint.
It's a place where there are plenty of viewpoints.
There's a reason for that.
When somebody loves flowers as much as Kristina,
you can see this, she's gonna make a flower post.
Can you imagine that?
- [Kris] I'm literally risking my life.
- This is seriously one of those places that you don't know
if you're still in planet Earth or you are in Mars.
- I think you're not in Mars. I think you're in heaven.
- It's like the Instagram reel.
♪ Dun dun, dun dun dun, dun dun ♪
What is this place?
You can do a lot of outdoor activities, lot of trekking.
What I'm saying is a good thing
because you have good food.
You're gonna eat and drink a lot.
You will burn it the following day.
I hope I'm not gonna die in the attempt
of going all the way down.
From my perspective, you can spend easily one week
in each of these islands, nine weeks in Azores.
If you wanna get a flavor.
You have three pools here.
The first two are very, very warm
and the last one is like 10C, 15C degrees less.
Not too bad. It's not like a cold shower type of thing.
We need to be careful because it's boiling water.
This is called Caldeira Velha, like the old boiler.
We're gonna get in one of these Caldeiras,
one of these boiling water pools.
This is thermal.
This is good for your hair,
for your skin and for everything.
This is actually very hot.
Does it bring a vibe like Dominica?
- Yeah, a lot, with this whole, lush forest, waterfalls.
Probably the only difference is
that in Dominica the water was freezing.
- Here it's volcanic water.
- Yeah, so it's boiling water really.
You need to book online
because it's super, super crowded.
The night before you come,
you have one and a half hour slots.
You pick the one you want and you pay your ticket.
It's like 10 euros per person.
This is the iconic thermal water. 10C degrees lower.
- I think we should have come here first
and then go to the hot one.
- I agree. I agree.
Okay, any similarity you see to Dominica is not true.
The video I made a year ago, it's in a different place
in the Caribbean.
This is Azores. Welcome to Dominica.
Oh no. Welcome to Azores.
These pools are amazing.
The one thing you need to pay attention is
that they can be very crowded and you can have some frogs.
So if you're scared of reptiles, maybe it's not for you.
We finished these thermal waters and now
we're in another "miradouro", there are scenic view
points everywhere here.
Okay, the weather is super misty
but it's clearing and we can see the proper lake.
Obviously if you go to the mountains you see nothing.
So maybe we will fly the drone here to explore the area.
And Kristina is doing something super brave.
She's climbing in flip flops.
This weather makes me super,
super tired because it's high humidity.
I think it's like 70% humidity or something like that.
It was raining early today.
Forecast is rain for the next four or five days
even though it's not raining right now,
for some reason I feel super tired here.
On the other hand, how can you be tired with this?
So we're gonna enter now one
of the very few tea factories left in Europe.
Actually have the whole tea plantation here as well.
But first let's go and see how they make tea.
(upbeat music continues)
I cannot believe this is free.
We saw the whole process from the beginning till the end.
We bought tea for six euros,
but we saw pretty much everything for free.
There were some boxes for donations and stuff like that.
We crossed the street and we are in the tea plantation.
One of the very few left in Europe and still free. Crazy.
- What do you think about this wedding?
- I don't need to worry about anything, so just chilling.
(speaking Spanish)
- [Ale] Nervous?
- No.
- Nobody wants to be on camera.
(uplifting music)
- This is a proper wedding in Azores.
- Yeah, you can hear Portuguese folklore band
singing and dancing.
(celebratory music)
So we just got a moment just
while still quiet here just to say some few words.
- Yeah, and behind us we have Vila Franca,
absolutely beautiful, the place that we have.
- Since the island weather is unpredictable, we never know.
- Yeah, in São Miguel Island you can definitely
do a lot of different things
and then you minimum need to stay here for a week.
A lot to see.
- [Kristina] Very minimum.
- [Host] Yeah.
And then you have another eight islands to see like us.
(dramatic music)
(beep)
(dance music)
(cheering)