Hi all,
Today I am going to tell you about the hiking trails we did in Madeira. In all the tourism agencies they had the same 9 hiking trails advertised, all easy between 10 and 12km.
I must point out that when we searched for trekking routes on the internet, there were things like “walk from the center of Funchal to Formosa beach” and that is not a hiking route, it is a walk on the street. This is because in Madeira to do a decent route immersed in nature, you had to do at least one hour by car. So, for locals it is almost impossible to do these activities during the week.
The route to Pico Ruivo is the most important and we could not do it since the first day we tried it, it was raining and the road was skidding so we could not reach the starting point of the route. The second day that we were going to try to go, a storm hit Madeira.
The routes we did were the following:
- Rabaçal – 25 Fontes
This is one of the “must” things to do on the island. We arrived almost at 11 in the morning and a bus of people just arrived to do the same route; So, we were almost running so that the crowd would not catch up with us.
In the guides and blogs, they state that it is very important to arrive early so as not to run into the many agency buses. Fortunately, at that time with the covid situation, there were not many people either, but it would have been better to arrive early. If there was already a queue to take a photo at the waterfall, imagine in high season.
The route is beautiful, but nothing too special. You see first a tall waterfall and then the one called “25 fontes” which is tiny.
- São Lourenço up to Cais do Sardinha
This was the place I liked the most in Madeira. In fact, I imagined that the island would be full of places like that for hiking.
It is a short route of 6 kilometers, and it is a bit cold due to the wild wind; in some parts you had to hold on because the wind takes you. The views are beautiful.
Here I also leave you the route that Diego did swimming the next day. I was so cold that I couldn’t even get into the neoprene suit.
- Levada dos Piornais by the west of Funchal
The last week after touring Funchal we were shocked because it seems incredible, but there is nothing to do there without taking a car.
At the end, we found a circular route of “levadas” (irrigation canal or aqueduct) through the western part of Funchal. We left the house and after 30 minutes going up a street almost vertically, we reached where the route began. It was not a “hiking” as such because we were not in the middle of the mountain, but we were walking next to houses and banana fields.
It was like the sidewalk of the people who lived up there. Most of the way it was along a very fine line of cement, and you had tobe careful to avoid putting your feet in the water. Halfway there we had to go through some small caves and that really scared me because we were going along the same concrete line at the edge of the precipice. In addition, the railing to hold on was far apart and you could easily fall through the gap between the floor and the railing.
Here is the link to my YouTube channel: