I first visited Madeira in the summer of 1977. I visited with my parents and as I had just completed my studies and about to embark on a new career, they paid.
We landed on the original very short runway. I think most people on the plane had either landed previously or had been pre-warned about the airport as there was a 'deafening' silence among the passengers on the final approach .
Our accommodation was at the comfortable Hotel Madeira Palacio (I believe it was previously known as Madeira Hilton) - west of Funchal. The hotel at that time stood in isolation among the banana plantations . It has sadly been derelict for some years but I was pleased to see ENOTEL has taken over the re-build . What is now the Lido Area was banana plantations at that time.
A novel way of getting around Funchal was the bullock carriages - I was suppose it was the HOHO bus back in the day.
There was no cable car so it was by bus that we traveled to Monte - it was a few visits later before I plucked up the courage to go in the toboggan .
As the original post says, there were no shopping centres and most of the shops were in the centre of Funchal - with the odd one dotted here and there - one being what was called 'A Rosa' flower shop. My parents used this shop over the years to buy flowers to take home
.I have visited many times since and have , of course , seen a lot of development over the years but would say that Funchal has , in the main, been developed in a tasteful way.
Much of rural Madeira is still pretty much as it was then.
