seasoned ranker wrote:
Interesting. I went to Madeira a few years ago and will give my thoughts. Everyone was incredibly hospitable, but I will qualify that statement by saying that I was interacting with natives in their little coastal hamlets, not really spending much time in the city of Funchal. But in terms of being a tourist, some of the most pleasant interactions I've ever had (poncha might have helped).
I want to have more information on what trails each of these runners went missing on. A lot of them are hard to get to if they aren't popular, and also aren't necessarily maintained well. Much of the hiking in Madeira is along old irrigation levadas with tunnels and steep dropoffs prevalent nearer the center of the island.
As for the lack of suspicion of the local police, that might contribute to bodies not being found. The center of the island is not developed at all and so if someone fell in a tough spot to get to I could absolutely see the local police not having the resources/will to try to scale to the bottom of a ravine to try to find a body. This isn't a Colorado 14er scenario. That said, 4/4 not being found (if that's the case) does raise some eyebrows.
This site would be so much better is we got more replies like this (sincere and offering information) and we could skip all the stupid, flippant crap.
I, too, think this is interesting and would like to learn more. Like, are the families screaming for more action? Are they scouring the place to find something? Do they know which trails were being used or when the runners were last seen?
This reminds me of when several college students fell into rivers in La Crosse, WI, and people weren't sure if there was a serial killer or if they were all just falling in during the walk from the bars back to the dorms.
