Vocabulary

local	cuisine	past two weeks
climb	feel/felt	swim/swam/swum
cave	handful	fly/flew/flown
cover	hillside	souvenir
bush	light (3)	grow/grew/grown
wide	ground	drink/drank/drunk
hardly	barely	make out
grab	sphere	notice (2)
reach	strange	happened to
clay	marble	reply/replied
size	remove	dry/dried
pea	over (2)	memento
pass	harbor	around (2)
sail	deep	take back
silly	cruise	buy/bought/bought
trip	suggest	remaining
go on	right (4)	throw/threw/thrown
glassy	laundry	catch/caught/caught
scrape	partially	begin/began/begun

 
 

The Madeira Islands

Ah, the Madeira Islands!

For the past two weeks, we swam in beaches, visited old churches, ate local cuisine and drank wine in restaurants and cafes.

Tomorrow Morning

Now our holiday was almost over. I wish we could have stayed longer. But tomorrow morning, we are flying back home.

We have to return to work on Monday. Ugh.

The Forested Hill

So this morning we climbed up a large forested hill. As we went along, I happened to notice a small cave on the hillside. It was partially covered by some bushes growing around it. I walked towards it.

The Cave

The cave was about a meter and a half above the ground, and about 30 centimeters in diameter.

I looked inside.

But I could hardly see anything because it was so dark. However in the back, I could barely make out something.

Objects

I reached in with my hand . . . and touched . . . something. They felt hard. I grabbed a handful and took them out.

They were brown and spherical.

“What strange looking stones,” I told my wife, Susan.
“I think they are dried clay,” she replied.

Variety

I reached in again and removed all the objects, some 50 in all. Some were about the size of marbles, others were as small as peas. The largest were about the size of golf balls.

I put all the stones into my backpack.

“What are you doing?” asked Susan.
“I’m taking these back as mementos of our trip.”

The Harbor

On our way back to our hotel, we passed by a boat harbor. Susan suggested that we take a boat cruise.

As we sailed on deep blue waters, Susan said it was silly to take home all these little, brown rocks.

“We’ve already bought lots of souvenirs from the shops and markets. Our suitcases are going to be overfilled and heavy.”
“You’re right,” I said.

Throwing

So I took a stone from my backpack and threw it into the deep, blue ocean. Then I took another and threw it. This went on until I had thrown all the stones into the water.

Next Morning

The next morning we flew to London and caught the train back to our home in Nottingham.

A few days later, I did the laundry of our clothes from the holiday.

Doing the Laundry

As I took my backpack out of the washing machine, I noticed a little stone on the bottom of the pack. It was one of the stones from the cave, the smallest one, smaller than a pea.

Wash Away

I noticed that the washer had washed some of the clay away. Then I saw something underneath the clay layer. I took out a knife and began scrapping the remaining clay away . . .

It was about 3 millimeters wide, and sparkled in the sunlight.

 

Questions

1. The writer and his wife had gone on a trip to the Madeira Islands. Is this true or false?

2. Describe some of the things that they did there.

3. What did they do in the morning of the second to the last day of the trip?

4. In the afternoon, they went to a cafe. Is this right or wrong? What happened in the afternoon?

5. Did the writer discover something back in England?

6. How do you suppose the writer feels now?

7. What do you think the writer will do next?
 
 
A. I have visited an island or tropical or subtropical place. True or false? What did you do there?

B. What are some popular holiday destinations for people in your city?

C. Have buried treasures been discovered in your city, region or country? Are there buried treasures in your city or country?

D. Have you or your friends done things that you later regretted?

E. I feel lucky to have done certain things; I’m glad that I did certain things. Yes or no?