Coming Home: Wednesday Nov. 11, Madeira, Portugal

Pretty and Junk

We decided to go with an excursion in Madeira. We took a scenic tour that took us all over the island, where we got to see the bananas and at a higher altitude, the grapes that make the wine Madeira is famous for. We went to Europe’s highest sea cliff (for some reason, I guess because it is a territory of Portugal, they consider Madeira part of Europe even though it is closer by far to Africa). We found the island beautiful. We ended our tour at a Madeira wine tasting room. We have cooked before with Madeira wine, but never drank it. After this it will remain that way. The “semi-dry” variety we tried was insufferably sweet. We dared not attempt the actual sweet or desert varieties. The dry variety we drank tasted like raisins instead of grapes. We went around the picturesque town on foot, shopping and seeing the sites. To cap it off we sat down at an ocean front café for Madeira’s other popular drink, Poncha. Poncha is a liquor that is lemon and honey rum served on ice.  This drink is dangerously good. After one tasty glass we enjoyed greatly, we found that it is a bit more alcoholic than one might thing. We smuggled a bottle on board the boat to drink at home.