Funchal
Page 2

Funchal (Madeira) Portugal – Part 2
 

So after hiking up the hills in the gardens, we walked along the road with lots of other folks until we reached the

top of the "toboggan run." The line here was long and didn't move as quickly as at the teleferico. The toboggans

are sledges woven of rattan on wooden runners with room for 2 or 3 if the third is a child. They have a lightly

padded seat and are steered and braked by a team of 2 guys with very strong arms, legs and special boots. The

course is 2 kilometers and is a narrow street which runs all downhill and very steeply. The teams are dressed all

in white with a hat, like a costume or sort of like a gondolier would wear. They take a sledge down and then the

sledges come back by truck and the guys come in a small bus. So you have to wait until both enough sledges and

teams are back to the top of the hill. Fortunately for us the majority of Brits from the other ship had come earlier

as they were leaving port at 2:30 as compared to our 5pm. That meant that we only waited 45 minutes for a 5

minute descent.

Let's say it is exhilirating! You can't wear your hat and you have to hold on to anything you have in your lap. You

are careening straight down hill (in some places there is actually oncoming traffic!) and around sharp curves. The

2 guys are talking to each other the whole time, in Portuguese of course, so you have no idea what they are saying

– probably derogatory remarks about another load of tourists. Sometimes you are going sideways down a hill, and

every now and then you think you are going to catch up with the sledge ahead of you. The paving on the street has

shiny spots where the sledges have been going over them and you can smell the wood runners burning as you go.

At one point they slow down and take your photo for you. (Everywhere you go now, there is someone taking your

photo and then producing it for sale at the end of the visit. This time it even had a CD of local music attached. We

just took the one the guys took and didn't bother with the professional ones, either here or on the teleferico.) When

you get to the bottom of the run, you are about half way down the hill to town.
 

After the run, we took a sedate taxi ride to the center of town. Our driver was local, but had actually worked in

Miami and Los Angeles, so was interesting and had lots of information. He told us that there had been 4 ships and

10,000 tourists in port the day before so we would have had to wait even longer for everything. He dropped us off

on the main street and we walked around for a while and checked out the winery where they make Madeira wine

and Malmsey, but did neither the tour nor the tasting nor the buying. Funchal is a clean, attractive and pleasant

town to visit. The architecture is interesting and there are lots of stores where you can buy the embroidered table

cloths they are famous for. We enjoyed the stop a lot.