Madeira 2023

Day 1 – First impressions

We landed a few hours before lunch and by 1300 we were out of the airport in our hire car, travelled 40 minutes and stopped at a cafe/restaurant for lunch. We had booked a Fiat Panda, but surprisingly we got a free upgrade to a BMW saloon – it seems us old fogies are considered a safe bet for a sportier vehicle. Personally, I’d have preferred the Fiat Panda!

Madeira is very ‘rocky’ and most apartments are built on the slopes. We were very pleased with our apartment location which also gives us a tremendous view.

…..and the view from the breakfast veranda was amazing.

This evening we’ll travel down to the coast to a restaurant the apartment owner has recommended. Tomorrow we’ll enjoy a breakfast watching the sun rise in the morning before heading up into the hills to search out some photographic viewpoints.

Day 2 – Geriatric hill walkers

At 4am this morning there was about 60% cloud cover, so I decided we could have a later start today. We headed up in the hills to one of the 2 major peaks on the island – Miradouro do Juncal, at 1,818m high. At this altitude there wasn’t much oxygen for us aging hill walkers. Before you ask – yes we did drive all the way to the top! The views were fantastic as we were high above the clouds:-

One of the well known walks up here is the ‘Stairway to Heaven’

If you look carefully you can see steps traversing up and down the mountain slopes. We started down the trail towards ‘heaven’ but when I turned around I was surprised to see- my wife with a halo!

For those of you that know her, that is about as unlikely as her going to church!

We only managed a few hundred yards and decided to turn back as we were having difficulty breathing. Eventually we made it back to the car and then headed to the north east part of the island.

12,000 steps later on a warm afternoon the two geriatrics limped back to the car.

Day 3 – the alarm was set for 2:50am

So what could possibly require such an early rise? We had a 1 hour drive back to Miradouro do Juncal to arrive by 4am to attempt to photograph the Milky Way. I use an app on the phone – ‘Sun Surveyor’ which shows exactly where the Milky Way would appear in the sky and whether or not it would be visible. Well the app was correct and as the mountain peak was way above the cloud cover we were hopeful of clear skies.

One of the images shows a slight redness in the sky – this was a reflection from the red warning lights at the top of the mast on some very high wisps of cloud.

The Milky Way fades from view around 5:30 as the western skies begin to glow from the pending sunrise – so we retired to the car for breakfast. About 30 minutes before sunrise there were hundreds of people arriving to see the sun rise – me on the other hand wanted to photograph the sunlight falling on the mountains:-

Headed North west from here and stopped along the way for our first hot drink of the day – five and a half hours after we got up!

After taking the longer scenic route along the north coast we arrived at
Praia da Ribeira da Janela. Along the beach, Vanessa spotted a few surfers…..

Meanwhile I was trying to capture some interesting waves

Later joined by Vanessa…..

A short break for lunch followed before we headed off to the Fanal Forest which can frequently be covered in an erie mist – but on this occasion the forest was clear. We will definitely return back here hoping to catch the mist.

Whilst in the forest we heard a loud sounds coming from the vicinity of a small pond – on investigation, we found the deafening racket to come from mating frogs. The images below show what else we found in and around the pond:-

At 4pm we arrived back at our apartment – completely exhausted from the long day. Tomorrow will be a lazy start.

Day 4 – Heading west along the south coast

After yesterday’s ridiculously early start we had a late start and headed west in search of a few waterfalls. The first stop was only about 15 minutes from where we were staying – along a closed off road. The reason for the closure was obvious when you see the image below:-

Cascata dos Anjos – The road is clearly dangerous with the waterfall dumping all over the road.

From here we headed to the little harbour town of Paul da Mar – first stop the ‘Cascata do Paúl do Mar’ waterfall down by the harbour:-

One of us was intrigued with the upper waterfall – I could just image the top waterfall feeding into a small pond which then exits down the 2nd waterfall. So I had to get that photo – unfortunately I made all the effort walking up into the waterfall crevice to be totally disappointed that there was no pond! The path continued up (right of image) – but I didn’t.

I messaged the wife – ‘on my way back’, only to be greeted with ‘I’m having a cool one in the taverna’. At least one of us had some sense.

After lunch we walked through the town as we were interested in the patterned pavements. See below for yourselves:-

Everywhere on this island was spotlessly clean, but there’s always one lay-a-bout that ruins the tidy streets:-

At the other end of the town we noticed the surf and the surfers – so we switched over to the telephoto lens and spent 40 minutes photographing the surfboarding:-

Enough excitement for now – so we headed off to our last viewpoint – another waterfall, Miradouro da Garganta Funda

Unfortunately the whole island is awash with water running down the streets from the hills – but for some unknown reason, virtually none of the water was reaching this waterfall – there was barely a trickle – very disappointed.

Day 5 – Clear skies in the morning, early start again.

Irrespective of the clocks changing to summer time – we were up early and headed over to the Fanal forest again to try to capture the Milky Way again. At first sight it looked like we had a completely clear sky, but observing the photos, there is an orange glow in the sky – caused by high level cloud reflecting the street lights from the main towns along the coast.

The Milky Way was obscured by the high level cloud, so we decided to abandon the rest of the session. We had our prepacked breakfast instead, waiting for the sun to rise. Unfortunately that was also a flop – virtually no sky colouration.

To make use of the time, we continued to take more tree images, but this time with a little ‘black & white’ post processing.

Headed back to the car, but got distracted by a few birds that were happy to get quite close :-

Time for coffee, so we headed off to Porto Moniz

Not a town we can recommend – although it was a Sunday. So after the 1 hour parking ticket expired we headed back for a forest walk which leads to many waterfalls, but our tired limbs meant we settled on just one – the Risco Waterfall.

Ending up at the waterfall….

Enough for one day – headed back via the ER110 and then the ER228 – the latter being the most scenic route we had taken all week. May try this route again tomorrow.

Day 6 – If you don’t succeed at first, try, try again…

Gluttons for punishment – we thought we’d try Fanal Forest again at 5am for another attempt at capturing the Milky Way. The first image we took was disappointing as there was more high cloud.

So we patiently waited, which turned out to be the right action…..

It’s easy to see from the 3 images that as morning approaches, less and less stars appear on subsequent photos.

We waited for the sun to rise and took some more tree photos – but I suspect you’ve seen enough of those in this blog. We also realised we were tired and therefore a less strenuous day was planned.

First a stop with a short walk to a viewpoint just off the ER110 – Bica da Cana viewpoint

We then headed over to the capital city to wander around the Madeira Botanical Gardens at Funchal. Generally disappointed with the standard of most of the plants, but it was a more leisurely few hours for us. The view over Funchal was the most interesting image…