Tchau Madeira!

The last few days of vacation is always bittersweet. Even though we have two days in Madrid before we leap back across the pond, it feels like it's winding down.

Unfortunately, very rainy, blustery weather rolled in a few days ago and has waylaid a few of the higher up hiking trails we wanted to do. We've had to move lower in elevation, which means no more peak bagging and overall, not quite as exciting of adventures.  So we've hit a few more levadas than we thought, which are very cool, however very flat. But they have their own beauty. I've included some pictures below from these hikes.

Overall, we have absolutely loved Madeira. Never have we traveled to a friendlier place for walking and hiking. The food is cheaper than in the US and there are wonderful hotels and guest houses for well under $100. The wine is fantastic, views are amazing and it's relatively easy to get around. Car rental prices are reasonable and driving isn't too bad if you're good with hill starts on a manual, but they also have a great public bus infrastructure and taxis. The food is fresh, basic and not overdone. The people are welcoming and helpful and speak pretty good English. Come visit!!  It's a gem only an hour and a half from Lisbon.

We are looking forward to Madrid, even if it's a quick stopover. The weather that moved in here ended up grounding flights for a day or two, so of course we hope it's all clear tomorrow!  Now, to fit everything back in my suitcase. Ugh.

Along Levada Nova, you can see the clouds blanketing the mountains. 

A waterfall we walked behind. 

This was the scene on top of the island, around 5-6000ft. Total whiteout. Hiking?  No thank you. 

We tried to go up high again today to see this Levada fall. Unfortunately it was still in the clouds but we braved the wind and rain long enough to reach our goal!

Hiking. Every. Day.

Madeira is a paradise if you like to walk or hike. Wow, there are so many trails here. We've hiked every day but one!  On our last day on the north coast, we picked a coastal trail with wonderful sweeping views and big cliffs. It was beautiful. The weather held, amazingly, and we had a great afternoon. I've picked up a bit of a cold so we took it easy that day. Even though it was around 8 miles round trip, there were more manageable inclines than our previous treks.  Some pictures are below!

On the way up. 

Along the coastal trail. If you look closely you may be able to see the path carved into the rock. Just a few feet wide and perched very precariously. 

It's hard to get the scale of the cliffs but they were over 1200ft. They've put railing in some spots. But not all. 

The next day, we had to do a bit of driving to move to our last location in Madeira, Calheta. Unlike the cloudy and cool north coast, this side is sunnier and warmer. In fact, Tom is at the pool right now!

Anyway, we attempted Pico Grande today but we met with blustery cloudy conditions and had to turn back, just short of the summit. There is another, longer approach to this peak that we may tackle tomorrow if the weather looks good when we wake up!  The views were beautiful and we enjoyed the hike, right up until clouds surrounded us, the wind picked up and we realized we shouldn't be on top of a slippery rock right then. Beautiful scenery though, pictures below.  This was our lightest hiking day at around 6 miles. We will surpass that tomorrow for sure (weather permitting).

Beautiful views on the way up but clouds gathering. 

The acacia trees are blooming now. It's beautiful!

Our far away peak in the distance. We made it up to just below the peak on the right side of this picture. So close!!

What it looked like when we got closer to the top. 

And finally an almost total whiteout in the clouds. 

Sadly, we only have two more days on Madeira and then we head to Madrid for two nights before heading back to the US. It's always sad to be winding down vacation, we will just have to make the most of our last few days here. Speaking of which, it's time for dinner!!

All about clouds.

We went to bed socked in by clouds and woke up the same way. The locals told us on cloudy days, if you drive up in elevation, you can be above the clouds. So we enjoyed a lazy breakfast and then headed up, back to where we hiked yesterday to try to catch this!

Luckily, we did. We were in between two cloud layers...it was beautiful. The deep valleys and ocean views of yesterday were gone. Replaced by thick white puffy clouds settled along the coast and in the valleys.

I also woke up feeling like a have a cold coming on, so we decided to take it easy today. So, we hiked a levada, one of those ancient drainage ditches that Madeira is known for...we picked a somewhat flat hike, as our legs were still recovering from yesterday's big hike. Choosing Levada do Caldeirao Verde was perfect for us. It was probably around an 8 mile hike, but mostly flat and on a good trail. I believe there would've been killer views, but we were completely in the clouds, so it made everything look like an eerie scene in a movie. Huge drop offs accompanied us most of the way. They've put cable railing up on most of the super sketchy areas, but in some spots, it makes you really appreciate not having vertigo!

There is an insanely large drop off of Toms left. The trees are growing straight out of a sheer cliff. Impressive. 

Waterfalls along the trail. 

The hike was beautiful. Way different than the dry and sunny weather we've been having. The moisture felt good and we rarely have the opportunity to hike in the clouds back home. 

But I think tomorrow, if I'm feeling up to it, we will tackle something a bit more challenging!

Pico Ruivo

Pico Ruivo is the highest peak on Madeira at around 6100ft, ironically about the same altitude as our house back in Colorado. There is a good trail that links Pico Arieiro (3rd highest) with Ruivo. The trail is maintained and ridiculously well constructed, even with metal staircases in some areas and plenty of paving stones laid. That being said, it is not an easy trail. These two peaks may be of similar height, but in between lies a solid 3300ft  of ascent and 3300ft of descent. My knees are a bit angry with me tonight.

You can drive all the way to Pico Arieiro (think Mt Evans for you Colorado folk). We arrived around 9am and got started under a partly cloudy sky.  The weather held all day for us, it was beautiful and in the 60s. Absolutely perfect hiking weather!

There are sweeping views of jagged mountains and plunging valleys everywhere you look. It is truly one of the most beautiful hikes I've done. It's massive in every way. The alternate route that I wanted to take one way is closed due to a rockslide last year. That would've been a more challenging, longer and more exposed route, but it wasn't in the cards today. So we settled for an out and back of around 8-9 miles with killer climbs.  And for every quad burning  step up, there was a knee crunching one down.  Ouch. 

Morning vistas. 

Tom looking like an ant on top of that far away staircase.  

The terrain was ruthless. So many ups to be followed by downs. Usually when you climb a peak it's all ascent then all descent, it's humbling to constantly be giving up the elevation you just gained. And the alternating up up up then down down down really takes its toll on your legs, but it does break it up quite nicely.  We were plenty ready to summit. It was windy but not too chilly up there and we sat down and had lunch while enjoying the view. 

View from the top. Really awesome. 

From the summit, we spotted this tiny peak below and decided we should try to get it too. 

So we headed back down the trail until we found a good spot to leave it and scrambled up to the tip top. You can actually see Ruivo in the background, where we just came from!

A big thumbs down for the "fun" route being closed. 

We saw a pair of these cool birds on the way back down. 

With all this hiking, I think tom and I are running on a calorie deficit. A wonderful problem to have on vacation!!

Movin' on up, to the east side...

From Funchal (pronounced Foonshal) we've traveled to the east side of the island, to the small town of Santana. We've traded sounds of the city for the quiet rolling, terraced fields of vineyards and other local crops. It's much more peaceful over here. We're staying in a small hotel with a few hectares of vines that are just starting to leaf out. We are perched high on the cliffs that drop dramatically to the coast. Our room has a gorgeous view of the ocean, we have all of our windows wide open - waves and crickets are all we can hear.

We went for a walk along the coast earlier and started down a steep path to the ocean, just to realize that it was only an access path for local farmers to attend their small vineyard located precariously halfway down the cliff. They were very friendly and were working to clear it today, probably because the vines are coming alive for spring. Awesome views though.

Then we returned to the hotel and were checking out the old wine press and tasting room and stumbled upon a free Madeira wine tasting...oh darn. It was a perfect pre-dinner appetizer for us.  We've both really come to like Madeira wine in the last few days, it isn't popular in the US but I think we will continue to enjoy it from time to time.  It's a fortified wine, which I knew nothing about, but it is actually quite tasty!

On the drive over we stopped in Camacha and visited a wicker factory. We purchased a nice breadbasket and visited the strangest herd of animals I've ever seen. 

Tomorrow we are tackling the three highest peaks of the island. We have had beautiful sunny weather since we've arrived, but March is the end of the rainy season so I think we should bag those peaks while the bagging is good!  I can't wait to get some altitude...

A hikers paradise.

I think Madeira may be one of the best places for hiking we've visited. There are just so many trails. Everywhere. And there are buses to many of these trails and levadas. Levadas are the reason a lot of people visit Madeira but there are many non-levada hikes as well. There are peaks over 6000ft (which we plan to tackle later this week) and hikes along the coastline, which we did today.

Yesterday we did many touristy activities. 😄  We rode up to the Monte neighborhood in a cable car, hiked a levada up there (more on that later), had lunch with a great view, and took a wicker toboggan down the hill - only powered and steered by two Portuguese men!  This used to be a very real way they got down the hill here, but as Marco from our guesthouse said, they only go half as far and charge twice as much now. Ha!  We also took a tour of the Blandys Madeira Wine Lodge after our toboggan ride. Yum.

The Levada dos Tournos:  we started out under the cable car house on a well worn trail. It led away from the chaos and into the woods. Just a bit in, we crossed a pretty impressive bridge over a fairly fast running river.   You can see me perched up on the bridge below.

We wound our way up to the levada, passing a long abandoned house on the way. Everything is in bloom here right now. The flowers are spectacular. 

Before the start of the levada, there is this warning sign.

And rightly so, check out that drop off next to Toms foot!

We spent quite awhile along the levada, weaving through the forest. 

We finally switched back to the "trail". I say that in quotes because this area had burned recently and since the ground cover was decimated and trees killed, this is a slide area. We were honestly happy to finish the trail only seeing a fist size rock fall next to us. You can see the fallen trees below. Between the trees, drop offs, and stinging nettles over growing the trail, the last mile was interesting.

Today, we picked up our rental car that we will need to get to our next stop tomorrow. We leave the big city on the island (Funchal) and head to Santana on the east coast, definitely more rural.

Since we had a car, we decided to go out to the Sao Lorenco peninsula for a hike today. It was gorgeous and we had beautiful weather. High dramatic cliffs and rolling hills.

Our target is that far off summit. 

We've hiked no less than 10 miles a day for the past 3 days. My brain says this is paradise. My legs say they need a light day.  Bah, what do they know?

We're tired.

With a combination of my Madeira Hikes book, and a recommendation from Marco at our guesthouse, we chose what we thought was about a 9 mile walk for our first day on Madeira. This was made up of a 6 mile hike along a levada (ancient drainage ditches that Madeira is known for), a stop at a glass platform over a 1500 foot sea cliff and a return trip via the seaside promenade.

We had an awesome breakfast at the guesthouse, leisurely got ready for our day and caught the 1130am number 96 bus to Estreito, a small town about a thirty minute ride away. We found the start of the levada hike after a short climb up a very steep street and were immediately surrounded by vineyards. Madeira wine is made here and there are many small, family size vineyards that dot the countryside where we walked today. It is the very beginning of spring, so there aren't any green vines, pruning is still happening.  But it was beautiful. We walked next to the winding levada for just over 2 hours. 

Flowers are starting to bloom and they all seem to be very vibrant in color.

Tom walking next to the levada on his right. 

After many miles of small hamlets, valleys and terraced fields, we came out of the levada and found the sea cliff platform (glass-bottomed so not for those afraid of heights). Quite the drop.

From here, we expected a few mile walk/stroll along the seaside promenade. NOT.

The first part was beautiful. Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of this portion, but we walked among terraced vegetable and fruit fields for a mile or so, straight down, down down.  Drop offs everywhere and with everything just starting to grow, it was very green. Really interesting and beautiful.  Well I take that back. I took one picture. I like to call it "Creepy baby on a stick".

Then the not so interesting part started. Basically we alternated between being on the seaside promenade, then the promenade disappearing, us hoofing it back up a steep hill to find a passable road, then finding the promenade again. This went on, oh, for about ELEVEN miles.  When a local guesstimates the length of a walk, never trust them. Want to know why?  Because most of the time, they don't walk the routes they're recommending.

Tom got to test out his stellar elliptical skills along the promenade. 

And more good news, we found a Madeira wine tasting house along the way and stopped in for a bit.  

We definitely don't regret a bit of the walk, but 17 miles on a recovering knee, and Tom wearing his Chaco sandles makes for two tired tourists with some aches and pains - but it was beautiful, we saw a good portion of this area of the island and we certainly earned the dinner we woofed down tonight.

15K, my arse, Marco. 

Tomorrow?  Hopefully more hiking, although maybe a bit less of it. 😄