Port #2: Madeira
After we boarded the Crystal Serenity in Lisbon, we eventually set sail for Madeira, which is about 500 miles south of the mainland of Portugal. Madeira is known for its relaxed way of life and of course, its famous port wine. It took two days of cruising before we arrived at the port in Funchal, which is the main town on the southern coast of the island. We did an excursion in Madeira, which is a tour that’s organized by the cruise ship. Over the course of our trip, we tried to choose excursions that looked the most photographically promising. Our day started with a cable car ride up a large hill to a historic church that looked over the town of Funchal. Then we got to go on toboggan rides, Madeira style, in order to get down the hill. This sounds nuts, but the “toboggans” are essentially large baskets with seats in them. There are ropes attached to either side and your two “pilots” run along side the toboggan, steering you down the street with these ropes. We then spent an hour touring one of the island’s botanical gardens and finally ended up at a winery in town to taste some of Madeira’s famous port. After all this, we still had time to walk around town, exploring and shooting. As with all of these cruise port posts, I’d rather give you more visuals and less text to describe the experiences, so below are a bunch of photos I shot in Madeira. Above is a video that Karen made documenting our day. To see her blog post on Madeira, click HERE.
Next stop: Lanzarote! More to come…
