Both yesterday and today we have gone to Funchal, the big city. On Saturday we walked, it is about 5 miles and the guide book mentioned a coastal walkway which sounded good to us. It started off well with fine views of the sea on one side and a power station on the other but then the route diverted up a big hill and then we had walk along a busy road past lots of high rise hotels. Not so good.
Today went there and back on the bus the timetables and route maps of which are completely beyond our small brains. On the plus side they are cheap so if you get on the wrong one it does not really matter but from tomorrow we will have a hire car.
We saw the car with the loo painting whilst waiting at the bus stop and could not resist photographing it. Disappointingly the picture on the passenger door was just of some flowers, perhaps the owner did not want to upset their passenger.
Each morning the tour buses disgorge on the opposite side of the bay from our hotel where the guide book mentions “the quaint fishing village and harbour where Winston Churchill would spend his days painting”. As he was only on the island 12 days this is something of an exaggeration. The tourists all stand on the spot where he set up his easel and point their cameras at our hotel and get a picture of me in the nude as I open the curtains first thing in the morning!
The other thing they all photograph is a large mural of a monk seal made up of peices of plastic presumably washed up on the beach, it is very effective.
The food over the past two days has been impressive, if it carries on like this we won’t want to come home.
On Friday night we ate in a cafe close to the hotel and made a point of having local dishes and wine. Gill had fish which was good and very local, being brave I tried limpets (see photo). For some reason we don’t eat them in the UK but they are better than mussels mind you that is not saying much.
On Saturday night we ate in a large steak house, they had carcases hanging in fridges at the entrance to keep vegetarians away. There were probably 100 diners, all the restaurant do is steak and not surprisingly they do it very well. I had fillet steak on the stone – they deliver a hot brick to the table and a chunk of beef and you cook it yourself, that way you can’t blame the chef for over or under-cooking your meat. It was very good, we will go back.