Madeira

In recent months, at our photography group, I have shared some images of the island of Madeira. This also was part of my inspiration for my work at the poetry group just before Christmas. This Portuguese island is situated in the mid Atlantic approximately 1000km from Lisbon and 700km from the Moroccan coast. Despite the distances it is well served by air through Madeira airport. Many major holiday airlines including Jet2, TUI, EasyJet, Ryanair and British Airways offer flights there from the UK so it is easy to visit this tropical paradise.

Madeira Airport

There are many towns on the island for accommodation. Like most visitors when I went in 2018, I stayed in the Funchal which is a large city and is home to a wide variety of accessible hotels. I stayed at the Hotel Madeira which is centrally located in the main shopping streets, however, it is a very small rooftop swimming pool and the breakfast room can be a little small and crowded. The rooftop views are beautiful though

Views from the hotel

There are a range of hotels on the island that would be suitable for disabled visitors, some recommendations from the local tourist information include Pestana , Porto Bay and Enotel .

There is lots to see in Funchal. One of the must to excursions is the cable cars to the various gardens. From Funchal Old Town there is a cable car up to the tropical palace at Monte. There is also from Monte a cable car that transfers to the Botanic Gardens. Both these are fully accessible and worth a visit

One of the easiest ways to travel arround Funchal is with the open top bus tour. You can even go on an excursion with them to Cabo Girao, approx 10km from Funchal and is home to Europe's highest cliffs. Most buses have wheelchair access onboard.

There is a lot more to see on this island. Here is a virtual tour that shows more of the attractions on offer. There are many tour companies in the island offering accessible tours or you can get day excursions from your tour operator.

The island has many events throughout the year. One that I would like to go back for is the islands Christmas lights so maybe at a future All4Inclusion meeting I will be sharing photos from that trip.