A selection of the flora of Madeira. Below middle, a banana flower with above it some early-forming bananas. If ever you travel to a place where they serve it (generally southeastern areas of Asia, in my experience), do order banana-leaf salad or any other preparation of this interesting item. 🙂
Birds of Paradise were blooming beautifully just about everywhere we went on Madeira – in fact the guidebooks say that December is their month on the island 🙂
The church in the lovely little town center of Sao Vicente, on the north coast of the island at one end of a the “huge valley that tears Madeira into two halves,” to quote the LP pocket Madeira guidebook 🙂
(so much world, so little time....) 