Diving in Faial and Pico

Faial and Pico sit either side of a narrow Atlantic channel in the Azores' Central group, close enough that instructors live on one island and work on the other. Diving runs from two small bases, Horta on Faial and Madalena on Pico, out to the same targets: volcanic coastline close in, and, further out, the seamounts that draw divers to this stretch of the mid-Atlantic. The terrain is lava country, arches, tunnels, pinnacles and steep walls, with a submerged fumarole field close to Horta and a seabed that drops past 1,000 metres a short run from Pico's shore.

The signature dive is Princess Alice Bank, an offshore seamount whose pinnacle rises to about 35 metres out of open water, with no reef or wall anywhere on the dive. Divers hang on a mooring line in blue water for mobula-ray aggregations, mostly sicklefin devil rays, with counts topping 20 animals on a good day alongside giant amberjack, barracuda schools and yellow-fin tuna. Blue sharks are the area's second headline, a separate open-water trip with chumming, run mostly out of Horta on Faial, though a couple of Pico-based operators also offer it, July through September. Both trips swing with the weather: a calm day can bring the best shark dive of a trip, a rough one murky water and a quiet pinnacle.

Closer to shore, Ilheus da Madalena is an islet cluster two minutes by boat from the Pico dive shops, shallow and easy. On Faial, Boca da Caldeirinha sits in a sheltered bay at the foot of the Monte da Guia volcano crater near Horta, reported with moray eels, ornate wrasse and parrotfish over rocky reef. Dolphins, including bottlenose and common dolphins, and occasional sperm whales turn up on the boat run out to the banks. Whale sharks are seen here too, but rarely, and less often than around Santa Maria, so treat that as a bonus, not an expectation.

Fly into Horta (HOR) on Faial or Pico Airport (PIX) on Pico, then cross between them by the 20 to 30 minute car ferry if your operator works from the other island. Most operators expect Advanced Open Water and around 50 logged dives before the Princess Alice Bank trip, a multi-hour blue-water crossing ending in an open-water hang at depth. Condor Bank, the shorter shark dive at about an hour out of Faial, varies by operator: one requires the same Advanced Open Water plus 50-dive bar, age 18 and a check dive, while another runs a no-certification snorkel and shark-watch option instead. Offshore-bank season runs July to October, peaking July to September, with a few operators starting as early as June, and books out three to six months ahead in high season; local coastal dives run through the same months in calmer water. Pico has dive shops based at the Madalena marina, among them CW Azores; Faial's diving centres on Norberto Diver, the name that comes up across independent community accounts for shark and seamount trips. Build in a rest day before flying out: diving is not recommended within 24 hours of departure.