Funchal; Tuesday, 12 April, 2016

I had a decent night’s sleep and headed out into town to take in some more of the sights of Funchal. However, on my way into town I got diverted by the offer of a Catamaran tour along the coast which was departing about 90 minutes later so I signed up for that, and wandered off to find things to do to fill up the time.

Just across from the harbour is a small shopping centre that includes a theatre that shows a 30-minute film on the history and development of the island so I booked to see the next showing, which was in 20 minutes’ time, leaving me just enough time to head over to the Blandy’s wine lodge a short walk away and book onto a tour and tasting for later in the afternoon, just after the Catamaran was due back.

From having not much planned I’d managed to fill up most of the day in the space of about 10 minutes. I wandered back to the Madeira Film Experience and watched the very interesting film about the island and then headed down to the harbour to pick up the Catamaran.

The key selling point of the tour I went was that it was a much smaller catamaran than the others doing similar tours and had an enclosed cabin in case of inclement weather or rough seas. About 15 minutes after setting out in glorious sunshine it proved its worth as we hit a massive bank of rain with strong winds head on. Several of my fellow passengers didn’t have quite such an enjoyable ride as they spent the next two and a half hours being quite ill.

However, once the rain shower had passed and the seas calmed down a bit it was a very pleasant sail out to the base of Cabo Girão, past Câmera de Lobos. The sail out to the foot of the cliffs had taken nearly two hours and I was concerned that I might not make it back to town in time for the Wine lodge tour and tasting, but the current and winds (and another approaching weather front), helped to speed us back into harbour, arriving on the dot of 3 when we were supposed to arrive.

From the harbour I walked round to the wine lodge and went on a very interesting tour on how Madeira wine is produced, followed by the obligatory tasting of the product.

I wandered back down towards the harbour, and stopped in one of the cafes for a late afternoon drink and a snack as I realised I hadn’t actually had any lunch so far, then I headed down to the open-top bus tour stop to make use of my 48-hour ticket and pick up the penultimate city tour of the day.

I was a bit disappointed as the bus wasn’t properly open-top with a plastic roof in place, but about 10 minutes later when yet another spectacular downpour hit I wasn’t quite so disappointed, or soaked. I did a full circuit back to the harbour and then went for a wander along the seafront down to the Fortaleza de Santiago to have a little look around there and the historic old town part of Funchal.

The old town area is home to many of the city’s restaurants so I decided to have dinner down here, before walking the mile or so back to the hotel and another good night’s sleep