On The Sea Again, I Just Can't Wait To Get On The Sea Again: ATW 92

Monday we were in Funchal, Madeira, Portugal. We had made it to Europe. Why was that significant? It meant that this year, in the past 5 months, we have been on all 7 continents! (5 on this world cruise and 2 when we went to Antarctica)

Cruising in we saw how nice the weather was.

We've lost count of the number of times we've been to Funchal - it's a common port when you go transatlantic. With such perfect weather, we decided that it was a good day for a long walk and to explore parts of the city we might not have seen before. After a bit of a walk from the pier, we came to the Christiano Ronaldo Museum with its pretty awful statue of him.

The walk then became more scenic as we made our way along the waterfront.

It was then time for our first pastel de nata. I had done some research and we headed into the city to find the Nata 7. Along the way, we passed an interesting art exhibit.

When we arrived at Nata 7, the sign on the door indicated that it was closed that morning and did point out that there was another location. So I looked again and saw another highly rated place for pastel de nata nearby only to find that it was closed for vacation! So we settled for a coffee shop where the service was slow and the pastel de nata was just okay. But even okay pastel de nata are good!

We then continued our walk on streets we did not recall walking before until we arrived at the Mercado Dos Lavradores - the farmer's market.

You know that it's Monday when the fish market is empty. The fishermen don't fish on Sunday!

The rest of the market was open.

And you know that you are in Portugal when you see elaborate tile work.

Leaving the market, we walked down to the waterfront to get more steps in and to get us ready for lunch.

On our way to the market, we had passed a shop that offered sandwiches made with traditional Madeiran bread. We couldn't resist stopping for a vegetarian sandwich.

It turned out that there was a Nata 7 just a few doors down from the sandwich shop so we had to stop and have pastel de natas (including an unusual pistachio one) and a glass of Madeira wine.