Hiking in Funchal — circular route on Madeira Island

After a very short night 💤⏰️ and an early flight 🛫, we land in Madeira in the morning. Hardly arrived, we pick up the rental car 🚗 and drive directly to the hotel – leaving enough time to explore Funchal. The capital of Madeira welcomes us with its very own charm: narrow streets full of life 🥳, colorful market stalls, the sight of tropical flowers 🏵🌼🌺 and the loud roar of the 🌊🌊 Atlantic in the background. The weather is typically Madeiran – changeable 🌦 and fresh, almost like on the North Sea. But we manage our little tour without rain showers. It quickly becomes clear: On Madeira, no step is without an incline, fitness is definitely required here! In between, the city rewards us with beautiful views of the Atlantic and the surrounding hills, which make us want to do more tours 🚶‍♂️🚶‍♀️. (Small note: The photos are a bit mixed up – the camera time was still set to mainland time. 😉)

A wonderful tour through the old town of Funchal. In the Rua de Santa Maria, a narrow alley in Madeira's capital Funchal, you can admire a very special art project. Artists have come together here to counteract the increasing decay of the old alleys and breathe new life into them. The oldest street in Funchal is the Rua de Santa Maria. It is narrow and mostly shady and, apart from the localities that are now located there, did not seem as inviting as other alleys in the old town. Here and there the plaster was crumbling from the facades and the word "attractive" was hardly appropriate here in the past. Young Portuguese artists recognized exactly this problem and breathed new life into the alley. The "Art of Open Doors" project In 2011, the painters began decorating around 200 front doors and gates with paintings. This in turn attracted other artists and gallery owners who settled in the alley.

Funchal on Madeira is always beautiful. Today we went exploring at 29 degrees and a light breeze. The only downside is that the market hall is closed on Sundays

Yesterday we "complained" that we would have liked to have had a few clouds in Fanal. Big mistake - today we had them in abundance! It rained all day, the first day that the weather forecast was pretty much right. Hiking on a rainy day is not the best idea because of the terrain. So we drove to Funchal, where you can potentially take the heavy rain phases under control or sit out in a cafe. At the beginning the mix was OK, it didn't even rain half the time. But that changed later, and towards the end of the tour the (almost) rain-free phases became shorter and shorter. Nevertheless, the city was quite full - in the harbor there was a rather small and a huge cruise ship. The round essentially corresponded to what we had done 4 years ago. So we didn't see much that was new. The market in the middle of the city was new to us. We also discovered a very inexpensive way to eat (away from the crowds of tourists)! Not far from the port, just behind the large park, there is a fairly new, large shopping center (La Vie). There is a food area with various providers on the lowest level. We found the small sandwich bar in the middle particularly interesting. Two large tuna toasts and a freshly squeezed orange juice for €4.20 or a double espresso (very good) for just over €1, even in the capital you have the usual prices outside of the tourist ghettos! Sure, tourists don't stray here... In the harbor we were a bit confused at the beginning, the water was very brown in large areas (as if heavy seas had churned up the bottom). But later we saw the real reason: There are some normally almost dry streams running through the city. Now, with the rain of the last few days, they carried a lot of water (which carries a lot of soil with it - enough to color the sea)!

On the second day on Madeira we walked along the promenade again and then through some small alleys (Rua de Santa Maria) whose front doors were artistically painted. After a cappuccino stop we went to the Jardim Municipal do Funchal (a small palm garden) and from there up to the Sissi. Below there is another small but beautiful park (Parque Santa Catarina) which is worth a look. On the way back to the ship you pass an inconspicuous house which is said to belong to Christiano Ronaldo.

Funchal is by far the largest city in Madeira: A good 110,000 people live here, almost half of the inhabitants of the entire island. The location in a wide, curved bay on the south coast is exceptionally beautiful: down by the sea is the historic city center, which is characterized by wide boulevards, lots of greenery and a spacious promenade area by the sea. The old town area has been largely kept free of large modern buildings and therefore offers an almost completely historic impression. Many streets and squares are paved with the typical small-scale paving made of white and dark gray stones, which are arranged in elaborate patterns and ornaments. The Rua de Santa Maria, which begins a little below the market hall, is the oldest street in Funchal; this is where the city's nucleus was. Today, the Rua de Santa Maria, with its cozy, ordinary-people atmosphere, is a trendy entertainment mile with numerous bars and restaurants and is particularly lively in the evenings. Unfortunately, many of the old houses are uninhabited and in an advanced state of disrepair. The "Arte Portas Abertas" project, launched in 2010, brought color to the street: local artists designed the doors and sometimes the facades of the otherwise inconspicuous old houses according to their ideas. The extremely diverse works stand in attractive contrast to the dusty modesty of the houses and make the district a unique open-air gallery of contemporary local art.

... people people people 😁 today Walk 👟 in Funchal 🤗👍👌 along the Rua de Santa Maria, is considered the oldest street in Funchal ☝️ Project "Arte Portas Abertas" started in 2010 Artist painted doors 🤗🥰, in between we saw magnificently decorated churches ⛪️ and finally there was the O Regional a delicious Espetada 🙏👍🏻😋😋 Boa noite - até logo

Funchal is a nice little island capital. I actually imagined the place to be even nicer. Everything can be reached on foot. Monte is a little further up. You can also go by bus or cable car. Funchal (from the Portuguese funcho, 'fennel') means "place where fennel grows". The city got its name because the Portuguese found an extraordinary amount of fennel there when they discovered the island.