Background: Following its heyday as a world power during the 15th and 16th centuries, Portugal lost much of its wealth and status with the destruction of Lisbon in a 1755 earthquake, occupation during the Napoleonic Wars, and the independence in 1822 of Brazil as a colony. A 1910 revolution deposed the monarchy; for most of the next six decades, repressive governments ran the country. In 1974, a left-wing military coup installed broad democratic reforms. The following year, Portugal granted independence to all of its African colonies. Portugal is a founding member of NATO and entered the EC (now the EU) in 1986.
April 23rd 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira A Postcard from Madeira
It’s now nearly nine months since we returned from our trip around North America, and the English winter has recently been getting to our bones - time for a short brea ... 21 photos[full story]
March 8th 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira So this is it, my final entry of the cruise and what a time we have had.
Our last port of call.Madeira, was reached on Thursday around 0800hrs. The weather overnight had been somewhat rough and ma ... 8 photos[full story]
January 31st 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira Don loves the "elegant" and "genteel" feeling of Madeira and we both really enjoy the landscape, flowers and the sea. But after three weeks, we felt we“d seen and done most of what Funchal has to off ... [full story]
January 26th 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira The second thing on our "must see" list is a sailing trip the the Desertas. These are the three uninhabited islands you can see from Funchal. They“ve been declared nature preserves and you have to h ... [full story]
January 24th 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira Our first agreed upon "must see" before we leave Madeira at the end of the week was Monte. It's a village just above Funchal that consists mostly of villas and doesn't really have a town, just a squa ... 6 photos[full story]
January 22nd 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira The first week of being on our own in an apartment has flown by. We've achieved a routine of sorts. We rarely get out of the apartment before 11 a.m. as we eat breakfast, sit in the morning sun drin ... [full story]
January 18th 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira Moving to an apartment in downtown Madeira and settling in to a comfortable routine has been just a bit challenging. Why do I have to have a routine going to feel settled?
When we first arrived, o ... [full story]
January 16th 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira The final "tour" we purchased for the first week of our stay in Madeira was a "Typical Dinner". A minivan picked us up the hotel at 7:30 p.m. There were two passengers already in the van, a mother a ... [full story]
January 13th 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira Our first full day in Madeira, we signed up for three tours. The first was the sailing excursion that I last wrote about. The second was the Nun“s Valley tour we took on Thursday afternoon.
The m ... [full story]
January 11th 2008Europe » Portugal » Madeira » Madeira We booked a chartered catamaran to spend time on the water, view any wildlife that might pass by and cast loving eyes upon the fascinating landscape that is Madeira.
There wasn“t enough wind to sai ... [full story]
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