Monday – Funchal, Madeira, and ‘Just A Minute’
Today, we arrived in Funchal, Madeira. It was a short visit, with an early 7am, arrival, but also an early afternoon departure (2pm), so I decided to keep my plans simple.
After breakfast, I headed shoreside with the intention of walking into Funchal; a 20-30 minute walk. By the quayside, however, a free shuttle bus was about to leave, so I jumped on it and was in the town centre within 5 minutes. Funchal is very generous with its wi-fi; the whole of the main street is a ‘Free Wi-Fi’ zone, so I found myself a convenient bench and checked for emails. After that, I went for a walk through the town, taking photographs and shooting some video. Funchal is a visually interesting city, and there was lots to see; I didn’t have much time, though, so I gravitated roughly towards the cable car station, then made a sort of circular route back towards where the shuttle bus had dropped me off. The final part of my plan was to drop into a small supermarket that I knew from previous visits, located just around the corner from the shuttle stop, to buy some water to take back to the cabin. Once I’d purchased that, I could take a leisurely stroll back towards the ship.
Unfortunately, having walked from one end of Funchal to the other, then back again, I was rather surpised, and a little bit miffed, to discover that the supermarket was no longer there. This gave me a bit of a problem; I’d timed my walk so that picking up the water would be the last thing I did, allowing just enough time to walk back towards the ship. With the absence of said supermarket, it meant I had to go looking for another. Finding a supermarket in Funchal isn’t as easy as it might sound; walking back into the centre, retracing my earlier steps, I realised that I hadn’t passed a single supermarket; lots of clothing shops, souvenir shops and cafes, of course; it was busy, since there were three other cruise ships in port (P&O’s Aurora, a brand new Thompson ship and Aida Blu), and there were lots of musicians busking in the streets (the Native American band playing their pipe music, several lone guitarists and a quirky band with weird, extending plastic drums that we’ve seen before in Funchal); there were lots of little shops that would sell me small bottles of water, but that wasn’t what I was after…
Eventually, with time running out, I found one; a large one, too. It was busy, and I had to join quite a long queue for the checkouts, but two large 5-litre bottles of mineral water at 84 cents each was exactly what I was looking for, and my kind of price. Armed with my two large bottles, which grew heavier as I walked, I headed for the seafront and followed it back to the ship, with about 15 minutes to spare. On the good side; I now know where to find a good supermarket in Funchal!
We left the harbour at just before 2pm, with the Captain inviting passengers up to the higher decks, above the Bridge, for a better view, and Jonathon the Cruise Director throwing a sailaway party at the rear of the ship, as Madeira faded away into the distance. Up until that point, the weather had been warm and the air still; I’ve finally moved to phase-3 of my attire, from cream walking trousers to three-quarter-length ‘cut-offs’, and the sunglasses are out too. As soon as we hit the open sea, however, the wind increased and the temperature dropped quite considerably, so it was announced that the Marco Polo’s version of the game show ‘Just A Minute’, which was scheduled to take place at 4pm on the Pool Deck would be moved to the Show Lounge.
I’ve always quite enjoyed ‘Just A Minute’; it always attracts a large, enthusiastic audience, and is good for a laugh, so I spent a little while working in the cabin and headed upstairs at about 15 minutes to grab myself a cup of tea, then made my way to the Show Lounge. To my amazement; no-one was there except Grace (a singer), who was down for playing the game, along with Louise (lecturer), Ryan (another singer) and Jonathon; the game would be compered by Charles, the pianist from the orchestra. I asked where everyone was, and remarked on how popular it had always been when I’d seen it in the past. No-one quite knew why folks weren’t flocking to the Show Lounge (although, it might have something to do with the fact that it was freezing in there). At five minutes to four, and announcement was made, reminding the passengers that the show was about to start. Louise, Jonathon and Charles turned up, and a handful of passengers started dribbling in. I was about to go and take my seat to watch the show, when Jonathon asked me if I’d ever played the game before, to which my answer was no; I’d heard it on the radio before, but never taken part… at which point, out of the blue, I was given Jonathon’s place… Eek!
Well; all I can say is… I turned up. Ryan and Grace are very competitive and clearly very accomplished at playing the game. Louise is also a regular on the panel, and very good at it – I was the newbie… and I was a bit rubbish – just not fast enough at hitting my buzzer, and then when I did finally get a subject, I repeated a word and lost the play. Charles is brilliant at compering the game (and apparently excellent at playing it – he took over from Richard Sykes, who ran it on the last cruise, and he really is passionate about the game). Needless to say, I came last, with Ryan in front of me, and Grace and Louise joint winners. I was asked if I’d enjoyed it and would I like to play it again at some point on the cruise. Despite not being very good at it, I did enjoy it, and said that I would love to have another bash at it…. I’m sure I can come back stronger next time…
