Azores v. 4.8

After many, many years dreaming about it and seeing The Deep Blue I don't know how many times, today was THE day! Went swimming/floating with dolphins!!!!!!! Soft encounters, as they say, since you enter the water and, without actually swimming towards the dolphins, you wait for them to approach you... if they feel like it.
This was not the case. Although there were many dolphins, they seemed to be heading somewhere in a big hurry and, so, we just saw them going by, basically.
It is an overwhelming experience.......... one I would enthusiastically recommend... and I really cannot express what I felt and still am feeling...
I'll have to wait for the film of my underwater camera to be developed, the good old fashion way... I just hope the photos are not completely ruined. I'll be more than happy with one good frame, as I have the whole video still very vivid in my mind.
Next, my above-the-water-shots. All the featured dolphins, the "same" we floated with, are atlantic spotted dolphins (Stenella frontalis; golfinho pintado in portuguese).
Last, but not certainly least, swimming in the BLUE is in itself almost too much.........


A Cory's shearwater (Calonectris diomedea; Cagarro in portuguese) glances himself in the surface.


"Hi there!", "Hellooooo!".


This is a soft encounter. Two persons at a time, floating. I was next!


This is a different kind of Cory's shearwater. It is darker and has a nice beer-belly which it drags clumsily in the water when taking off.


Playground!


So many... and the BLUE.


"Say, your fins are kind of weird"


Aaaaaaah....


Aaaaaaaaaaaah!