11/11 – Funchal, Madeira – Last Port – #42 – on our 63-day odyssey

How many times have we been here? Heaven only knows. We decided early on that we wouldn’t bother with a car today and just stay in town. We’ve been so many places on the island, that we thought it would be nice to visit the Botanical Gardens here, as we’ve not done that on our previous visits. Most likely because it is up across the ravine from Monte, which is up there and we typically try not to drive in town too much.

Today there is a free shuttle (yay) that takes us from the pier to the Marina Shopping center – perfect for us because the bus to the Botanical Garden leaves from the Avenue do Mar, which is directly behind the shopping plaza. We grab the first shuttle and are at the center around 8:15, far too early to catch the bus as the gardens don’t open until 9. It’s cappuccino time!

We manage to snag a seat at a café right next to the bus stop and dig into two great cappuccini, topped with a huge dollop of excellent whipped cream. Yum.

Back out at the bus stop, we go into the bus kiosk and buy 2 tickets for the bus – but we only get one physical ticket. We’re hoping we can use it for both of us, but if not, I’m ready with my euros in hand. Bus 31A comes along tout suite and we hop aboard, and no, the physical ticket does not get both of us aboard. We have to pay for another ticket. Oh well – it is only 1.95 Euro – no biggie. Up we go, through the city, on streets we wouldn’t drive a Panda on but this big hurking bus just rumbles on up. At one point we have to stop and wait while a flatbed truck backs up the road in front of us to let us through. It’s Amalfi Coast on steroids!

This bus actually goes all the way up to the Teleferico, which is the last stop. We figure we’ll get off at the main entrance of the gardens which is 2 stops from the end. But I’ll be damned if we can figure out where that is! Nothing looks like an entrance gate as we drive up – and where the map on Moovit (the transport app for all over the world) says it is, looks like a wall. Poop. We end up just staying on until the end and figuring it out from there.

Which turns out to be a happy mistake. We are at the top of the gardens with an entrance below the cable car, which means we get to walk DOWN through the gardens, not climb UP to the top. Brilliant (as CD Claire would say).

We pay our entrance fee and buy the little map for 60 euro cents and we are off – the first ones in the garden – at least up here. There are 2 other couples behind us, but we quickly lose them in the multiple little paths that wend their way through the gardens. This place is wonderful, created in 1960 covering over 500 acres on various levels, there is a little bit of everything here. Plus incredible vistas looking down over Funchal city, out into the harbor with our ship (and the new Carnival beast of a ship), out toward the western part of town and the rolling hills as well northward where the cable car runs.

As we watch the cable car, it just reconfirms our decision never to go on one of those things again. We don’t even know where it goes, we just know we are not getting on that thing. It is too too scary!

Turning back into the garden itself, begin to just meander through all the paths, marveling at the flora and fauna. What ensues are far too many pictures, but it is just too pretty to not try to capture. Weird looking tendrils coming out of a fern plant. A really cool pond (what the map calls “lakes”) with koi fish (or an approximate) situated at the bottom of a fascinating stacked stone wall.

There are ferns and arbors and flowers galore (of which you’ll see plenty of pictures below). Particularly Birds of Paradise – yeah – too many pictures.

The main attraction is what they call the “choreographed gardens” which are gorgeous shrubs of all different colors planted in geometric patterns with the cityscape in the background. Beautiful.

There are cacti – really big cacti – and incredible cactus flowers.

And there is a little museum with tons of rocks and preserved, stuffed animals. But the most interesting things are the rocks with what looks like plant fossils on them, but are actually iron or manganese oxide formations. Really incredible. They look just like plant fossils!

We’ve wandered for a while and now it is time for a break. Cappuccino and Pasteis de Nata. Yes! Although the Pasteis we bought in Lisbon are far better, the atmosphere and scenery here can’t be beat.

More cacti follow our break, more flowers, and a cute little Santana Traditional house.

Getting closer to the lower exit, we visit the sculpted Topiaries, then head out to the final view point over the city for our last vistas.

Then we’re out on the street and making the fateful decision to walk down to the harborfront. Oh boy! Adventure on.

Sort of following Google Maps, we just basically head downhill, winding around the main road, then following our instincts more than that stupid GPS, veer off onto these narrow little stairs that are everywhere in this city. Down, down, down we go on a series of stairways, passing people on the way up. OMG – no way I could do this all the time! And these people live up here!

We keep thinking that maybe there is a road hidden on the other side of these houses, but no, it is all climbing stairs or nothing!

Half an hour later, we reach the end of the stairs, on the opposite side of the Monte cable car and proceed walking down Rua Dr. Pestana Junior, passing a bus garage painted with fabulous murals of transportation from different eras, through the Campo da Barca park with the cool statue of a woman of the woods (maybe? Don’t know, there is no explanation plaque, but she has a bag full of what looks like acorns and some sort of branch in her hand), entering into the main part of town and the mercado dos Lavradores, the local market.

Ok, it’s not local anymore, it’s a tourist destination and it is packed. There are a couple of stalls of produce and lots of flowers and touristy shops that line the walls, one of which we enter, debating on buying some Madeira wine (I’m running low on the original bottle we bought, oh, I don’t know, 15 years ago?) but quickly decide to skedaddle out of there – it is too packed. Eek. Way too peopley around here!

Plus, it is lunch time, so we need to start the restaurant search. And this ain’t the area to do it. Turning away from the market, we dive into the heart of the city, walking along the busy streets, stopping here and there to peruse menus, but most of the places on this semi-main road are cafes with pizza or sandwiches and we are in search of Espada – the local fish we adore.

We need to get away from the main thoroughfares, even if they are pedestrian thoroughfares. We luckily zig around a square and zag down this little almost alleyway where we find Adega da Queimada – the perfect little restaurant (with lots of local people there) with lots of Espada on the menu. We’re done.

The waitress/owner is a doll, and we easily order our beer and “medium” wine (yeah, it’s a half liter for only 6 euro – a single glass was 4!) and rolo de Espada plus filete Espada with banana, my favorite. The food is fantastic – and far too much. The sides plentiful, lots of veggies and potatoes. The rolo ends up being a huge hunk of fish – not filleted, so Ed needs to carefully cut his way through the pin bones. The filete of course is fried with grilled bananas….oh yum. Exactly what we wanted in exactly the type of setting we were looking for.

Now it is wander time. Our goal is the sugar museum (who knew) and as we wind our way through the maze of teeny tiny streets, we pass the Funchal cathedral, and lots of lovely pastel painted houses. The square where the museum is located has an interesting monument that looks like a stone carved shawl thrown over a plinth. Really cool, if not odd.

We find the museum easily enough, A Cidado do Acucar Museum housed in a 3 story building on the corner of the square. The museum is focused on the sugar production that made Funchal a cosmopolitan center in the 15^th and 16^th Centuries. Most of the artifacts here were found in excavations of the homes of the merchant Joao Esmeraldo who apparently was a prominent figure in the sugar trade here. And, as an aside, housed Christopher Columbus.

Most of the exhibit is in Portuguese, but the nice ticket lady gives us a 10 pound laminated book in English that explains the displays – mostly of 15^th and 16^th C pottery and relics. There is also jewelry, sculpture and paintings and a history of the sugar industry. It is interesting if not small, and we quickly cover the 2 floors of exhibits, then head up the stairs. There is a 3^rd level where artists have studios and then another that leads to what looks like a terrace on the roof. And while there are signs pointing up the stairs to the rooftop viewpoint, as we approach the door a woman comes out of an office on the top level and tells us it is not accessible for us. Oh, oops! Sorry!

Chastened we head back downstairs, to find that the witchy woman has even called the nice ticket lady and obviously given her grief for letting us get upstairs. Geez lady – no harm, no foul for heaven’s sake!

Anyhow, back out on the streets, we start to make our trek back to the ship, walking through parks with statues, exquisite landscape and those beautiful upside-down tropical flowers that Nancy Miller-Green grows at home.