Lisbon

An eventful 24 hours with our flight to Madeira turning out to be more dramatic than anticipated. Due to high winds we had two aborted attempts to land and ended up being taken to a near by island.

Unfortunately other flights had beaten us to it and there were no hotel rooms left so the decision was made to fly us all to Lisbon for the night. After two hours in the plane on the Tarmac we left for the hour and a half flight to Lisbon. After going through passport control and waiting a long time for our bags, we were taken on coaches to a hotel in the university district. After lots more waiting we got the keys to our room at 2am - exhausted! This is a mural on the wall outside the hotel.

This morning we boarded the plane to be told the weather was the same as yesterday and they didn't know if we could land but we would go down to Madeira and see if it was possible. Feeling rather nervous and worn after yesterday, fortunately we were able to land relatively smoothly in Funchal. The passengers gave a large round of applause and cheers in relief and to thank the crew for getting us in the ground safely.

Lisbon looks an interesting city - perhaps we can go there on a planned visit some day!