Madeira day 4 - If you love rocks, you have to go here!

        Today we slept longer. We wanted a day to “recover” and wander to different places. So we went to the opposite side from where we where (Funchal), in Porto Moniz, a little town situated in the north-west of the island. This place is popular for its natural pools. The seawater lava pools are naturally filled by the Atlantic Ocean’s high tide, offering a warm and safe setting to swim right through the imposing rocks. The scenery is unique and...oh man, do I love rocks so much!

        Unfortunately, it was cloudy and we didn’t took a bath here. BUT, after enjoying this wonderful views, we then continued our today trip to Seixal. I was surprised, and I hope you will be too, to find out that the name of the city comes from some type of smooth stone (seixo) that is found in the rivers and this was used to describe the geomorphology of the region. And really ain’t talking s#!t; we got down to the beach (Praia do Porto do Seixal) and what our naked feet felt was the smoothest sand in the whole world. We played a for a while with our naked feet in the ocean and then went for a lunch.

        It was around 5 o’clock in the afternoon and we decided that it is too early to get back home and we must complete the day with one more thing. Said and done. I knew there was a 1-hour (roundtrip) “hike” somewhere in Madeira. So at 6 in the evening we arrived somewhere in the middle of the island, in a very village in the middle of the forest. We searched for the entrance but there was nobody to ask. We wandered around and found a path going deeply in the woods. We were not sure where it was going, but after a few minutes of walk we met two people comming from the opposite way and they confirmed that that was the path to Vereda dos Balcoes (YASSS!!!). The road is pretty flat, so the walk to arrive here is very easy. It should take one hour roundtrip but we hurried up in order to arrive in time to get to see something.

        After 30 minutes of walking, we arrived at a balcony with a landscape that left us speechless. We found ourselves in the middle of the mountains, surrounded on all sides by green ridges. The sun has set half an hour ago, and it was starting to be foggy. Because of the light, our phones couldn’t capture the whole grandiosity of the view. It was by far the best random choice we did in this excursion. Even though, on our way back, we had to use our phone’s lanterns to see the because the night came over us while we were enjoying every second of this landscape.

        So that’s it; we couldn’t go a day in Madeira without at least a little bit of hiking. IT. IS. CONTAGIOUS! And that is why we fell deeply in love with this island.