ZECARTE TATTOO / The island
What to see on Madeira and what it means, written by people who live here: the places not to miss, the ones locals keep quiet about, and the food, forests and festivals in between.
Funchal
The capital of Madeira, built like an amphitheatre around its bay — and where the route ends.
Monte
The hillside parish above Funchal, famous for coming back down in a wicker sledge.
Câmara de Lobos
A fishing town of painted boats, ten minutes west of Funchal, that Winston Churchill came to paint.
Cabo Girão
A sea cliff 580 metres high, with a glass floor to stand on and nothing underneath it.
Pico do Arieiro
The third-highest peak on the island, 1,818 metres up, where you stand above the clouds.
Santana
The north-coast town of triangular thatched houses, inside a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.
Ponta de São Lourenço
The eastern tip of Madeira, where the green runs out and the island turns to bare volcanic rock.
Seixal
A black-sand beach under green cliffs on the north coast, with far fewer people than you expect.
Porto Moniz
Natural swimming pools in black lava at the north-west tip of the island, refilled by the Atlantic.
Fanal
A plateau of ancient laurel trees that appear and vanish in the fog, part of a UNESCO World Heritage forest.
25 Fontes
A levada walk through laurel forest at Rabaçal that ends at a lagoon fed by springs in the rock.
Ribeira Brava
A small town at the mouth of a river that earned its name, and the crossroads between the south coast and the north.
Calheta
The sunny south-west: a sugar-cane mill that still makes rum, a golden beach and a museum cut into the cliff.
São Vicente
The north coast at its most dramatic: green mountains dropping straight into rough sea, and a chapel built inside a rock.
Ribeira da Janela
Sea stacks off a pebble beach on the north-west coast, five minutes from Porto Moniz and missed by most people who go there.
Pico Ruivo
The highest point on Madeira, 1,862 metres, reached on foot above the clouds.
Santa Cruz
Where almost every visitor arrives: a runway built over the sea on 180 pillars, with a quiet palm-lined town underneath.
Machico
The bay where the Portuguese first came ashore in 1419, and the island's first town.
Porto Santo
Madeira's small neighbour, with nine kilometres of golden sand and the house where Columbus is said to have lived.
History
Six centuries in short: discovery in 1419, sugar, wine, and an island that learned to receive visitors.
Food and drink
What to eat and drink in Madeira: espetada, bolo do caco, limpets, scabbardfish with banana, and poncha.
Flora and fauna
A UNESCO laurel forest, the bird-of-paradise flower, a lizard found nowhere else, and whales offshore.
Festivals
The Madeira calendar: Carnival, the Flower Festival in spring, the Wine Festival, and New Year's Eve fireworks over the bay.
People and traditions
Embroidery, wicker, the pointed carapuça cap, the bailinho, and the hands that built the terraces.
Levadas
More than 2,000 kilometres of water channels cut by hand across the mountains, and the best walks on the island.