I got out of bed to find the missing chocolate in the middle of the quilt; it must have got tucked under during the bed turn down service and rolled out overnight.
Again, we sat outside for breakfast. The selection was just as good as it had been the previous day with some different choices, which was refreshing.
After breakfast we took a leisurely walk to the Monte cable car station and purchased tickets. The ride was lovely and smooth and gave us excellent views over the harbour and town.
We chose not to visit the Monte Palace and its tropical garden in favour of visiting the Botanical Gardens. This meant a short walk and another cable car ride, this time overlooking the Ribeira de João Gomes valley. Before going into the Botanical Gardens, we had a refreshing drink watching lizards basking in the sunshine.
We then descended into the botanical gardens which were delightful. There was a lot of walking up and down to view everything the garden had to offer. The famous carpet bedding was still spectacular even at this time of year.
We had lunch in the café where I chose banana cake accompanied by freshly squeezed passion fruit juice.
When we had seen all that the gardens had to offer, we caught the Botanical Garden cable car back to Monte where we had a drink to cool down before descending via the Monte cable car to Funchal. We walked back to the hotel to chill out before it was time for dinner.
We dined in the Vivaldi which was one of the few restaurants open on a Sunday. The restaurant was full but they were able to find us a table. The food was delicious and the restaurant had a lovely atmosphere. I chose salmon with shrimp sauce and Mr C chose parrot fish; both dishes were brought to the table under a polished metal dome. For dessert I chose mango and meringue and Mr C opted for passionfruit souffle. We accompanied the meal with a lovely local wine.
We stopped at a nearby bar for a nightcap, but for some reason we were ignored so voted with our feet and returned to the hotel’s rooftop bar instead. This turned out to be a good choice because as we arrived back at the hotel it was just starting to rain. There was a heavy downpour but the canopy over the bar kept us dry.
