Seixal, Madeira, Portugal

The Island of Madeira at the Heart


The Old ER-101
Troubled Pool
Faith Above the Abyss
Laje Beach II
North facing homes
Bride's Veil
Volcanic Eden
Cornering Houses
atlantic pool
the village
Tunnel to the Sea
Seixal and the Great North
Bride's Veil II
The New Beach
Laje Beach
Marine Conviviality
The Escarpments of the Village
Visitors to Madeira are enchanted by its almost tropical drama. In this case, the author must confess that it was the destination of his first three plane trips. That he has a friend from there, who made him be a bit from there. From the Madeira facing the endless North. From the fearless and welcoming Seixal.

Having a debut flight, on Christmas Day, with a landing at Funchal airport is worthy of note.

What to say then, when, after that landing, there is a journey by car between Funchal and Seixal, along the old road.

Two decades passed. The memory lingers. Hostess and expert on the way, Sofia Lima takes the wheel.

She takes us up and down the lethal ravines between São Vicente and Seixal, with the confidence of a rally driver that leaves us somewhere between enthusiasm and fear.

We enter and exit tunnels with poorly polished surfaces that demonstrate the hard work of pickaxes and the like, begun in 1950 and popularized as “pierced”.

Leaving them, we are left with the Atlantic either in front or on the side, often far below, where the waves punish the cliffs.

In the middle of winter, waterfalls bathe the narrow road and wash the car by force.

Large basaltic pebbles that accumulate next to the wall that protects vehicles from diving into the ocean, remind us that it is not just water that falls there.

They underlined the obvious fact that every trip to Seixal was an adventure. And Seixal hadn't even started.

We arrived about night. We settled in the inn that Sofia had reserved for us.

Shortly afterwards, we are having drinks at the “Arco-Íris” the unavoidable bar of the village, Manelito and Carlucho. And getting to know the hostess's cronies.

Seixal, the Oitavas, the Lapinhas and an Unbridled Party

It lasts as long as it lasts. In Madeira, traditions such as the Catholic faith are taken seriously.

In the calendar, December 26 dictates the Octaves of Christmas, so venerated that the authorities declared the day a regional holiday.

Seixal, Madeira Island, the Village

It is customary to go from house to house, in the religious version, appreciating the lapinhas (read nativity scene) of the neighbors.

In profaned practice, the custom serves as a pretext for a revelry that is as itinerant as it is rooted.

More than showing off the house's lapinha, each family welcomes visitors with food and drinks left over from Christmas (but not only) and neat. In the drinks, in particular, there are whiskeys and old brandies, homemade wine produced with local jaqué grapes and many others.

They offer themselves to the stranger with a kindness and firmness that do not seem to admit refusal. As time passes, accepting them produces unexpected effects.

When the visits begin, Lisbon friends stick together. Halfway through, without even knowing how, the group breaks up into different homes in Seixal.

I remember visiting some alone. One of them belonged to a couple of emigrants who had just returned from South Africa, proud to be able to taste the jaqué wine that linked them to the land. To Seixal and Madeira.

Later, we got back together in the “Arco-Íris”. At the counter, around the foosball table and more Coral Tónica. Each one, with their amazing stories to tell.

As we would come to understand, in Seixal, the Oitavos lasted, like, the whole week. Discovering the stunning scenery of the village and its surroundings compensated for waking up late and somewhat hungover at the “Brisa Mar” hotel.

A few days later, we returned to Lisbon. With lives still teeming with everything we had experienced in Seixal. With new friendships, some of stonecutters, then, living on the mainland.

The Summer Return to Seixal, Madeira

We arrived at summer vacation. Marques, one of those bricklayers with whom I kept in touch, invites me to return. He offers to stay with his family. I gladly accept the invitation.

Filipe, one of Marques' brothers, at the time and like so many Madeirans, still an emigrant in Caracas, Venezuela, spearfished in the offshore sea, as a rule, in front of the pier and the natural pools.

Day after day, this is how he assures us of fresh fish that his mother cooks for meals, accompanied by sweet potatoes and boiled semilhas, harvested from the house's garden.

Instead of the Christmas Oitavos and Lapinhas, it is the summer festivities in Seixal and neighboring towns that justify the festivities and the inevitable madness.

In the middle of the summer, this fun has a delightful bathing area. In the natural pools of Seixal. Off the Pier. In Poça do Mata Sete, baptized with the truth of the tragedy, however poignant it may have been.

And, a short distance away, but on the opposite side of seriousness, in Praia da Laje, which locals have come to call Jamaica due to the tropical look of the palm trees planted there a few years ago.

Despite the good-natured Caribbean imagination, its seafront has no traces of white sand or coral.

It is covered by large basaltic pebbles that the waves continue to polish and that inspire the coat of arms of the village, at the base of a complementary pebble (tree).

At the time of this bathing evasion, there was not even the black sand beach adjacent to the port, which today attracts thousands of visitors to the village every year.

When I bathe in it overlooking the grandiose landscape of the east of the North, I confirm that it is the best beach on the island of Madeira.

So I would classify it even if I considered myself exempt.

The Incredible Golden Road Monument

We go back along the old road and its tunnels between São Vicente and Seixal. We examine them with the attention they deserve.

We understand the work, the prodigious engineering and the costs that it required, to such an extent that it became known as the Golden Road of Portugal.

To arrive at the true value of the work, perhaps it is better to pay attention to the delays in life that it solved. For a long time, Porto Moniz was only reachable from the south of the island.

And, in periods of bad weather, a journey between the Funchal and Seixal (today 40km, 50 minutes), was done in the form of a roller coaster, up and down the crest of Encumeada. It could take four hours.

Or five. Or whatever they were, according to what fate had in store.

More than two decades later, on our way back to Madeira and Seixal, we travel through several of the modern and spacious tunnels that connect the towns in the interior of the island.

Today, between old and new, more than 150 tunnels make Madeira a Swiss cheese island.

Those from João Delgado and Seixal, replaced the daring ER-101, which has become a historic and tourist attraction, still with its adventurous touch.

Misadventures in Old ER101

We leave the modern road. We get into the old one, committed to recovering the feeling of what it was like to walk through it. Moments later, we regretted it.

The remains of the road seem even tighter than we remember.

It is soaked by different waterfalls whose origin we fail to understand.

Parts of the worn asphalt are speckled with splinters of basalt also fallen from the top, imperceptibly from there, of the cliffs.

Rather than playful, the experience turns out to be reckless. We reverse gear as quickly and as well as we can, in the tightness and imminence of the precipice, with the Atlantic, down there, insinuating itself.

We didn't know it yet, but daring came with a price. During the afternoon, we realized that one of the basalt chips had caused a slow puncture in a tire. When we passed through São Vicente, we wasted time fixing it.

The maneuver completed, we returned to the safety of the new road.

We take refuge at the Véu da Noiva viewpoint, the emblematic waterfall that plunges 110 meters into the sea, in front of the old route of the ER-101.

A Village as Sloping as it is Fertile

If Madeira is steep and vertiginous, Seixal abuses it.

The settlement of the north coast of the island and the village required strong determination and consistent ingenuity. Most of its houses are located between cliffs and chasms.

The gardens and crops are always inclined, like the local vineyards, arranged in terraces conquered from less steep areas of the cliffs, protected from the wind and the weather by barriers of heather and leafy ferns.

Even produced in redoubts that any outsider would classify as unusable and in small quantities, Seixal sercial grapes are resistant to gravity, mildew and powdery mildew. They have long enriched good Madeira wines, the drier ones.

Irrigation of these vineyards and other crops depends on the use of water from the river that runs down from the top of the river. Magic Fanal

 

Fanal. A Somehow Surreal Pasture

 

And it divides the town almost in half, through the levadas and canals in which Madeirans and Seixaleiros have become experts.

The last time we visited Seixal, we did it as part of a much broader project on the island of Madeira, outside of Christmas – New Year's Eve, the festival period or any other festivities.

We didn't stay there to sleep and we only managed to see two or three of the people we knew there.

Seixaleiros that Depart, Seixaleiros that Return

Since 1950, remote Seixal has lost population, mainly due to the diaspora to Venezuela, South Africa, Australia and many other destinations. During this time, the village went from 1360 inhabitants to just 656, in 2011.

We realize, however, that the tourist prestige of Madeira, which for several years has been elected “Best Island Destination in the World”, the attraction of the black sand beach and the access facilitated by the tunnels now take many more visitors there and from the four corners of the world.

At the same time, the atrocious reality in which the Venezuela and violence in South Africa, have made many Madeiran emigrants return.

Even though they no longer speak Portuguese, some open small businesses with which they seek to remake their lives. Even if they lack the big profits from other stops.

Even if they only have a view to the North and the immense Atlantic.

It receives them, as it welcomed us, the subtropical and Edenic embrace of Seixal.

Pico do Arieiro - Pico Ruivo, Madeira, Portugal

Pico Arieiro to Pico Ruivo, Above a Sea of ​​Clouds

The journey begins with a resplendent dawn at 1818 m, high above the sea of ​​clouds that snuggles the Atlantic. This is followed by a winding, ups and downs walk that ends on the lush insular summit of Pico Ruivo, 1861 meters away.
Paul do Mar a Ponta do Pargo a Achadas da Cruz, Madeira, Portugal

Discovering the Madeira Finisterre

Curve after curve, tunnel after tunnel, we arrive at the sunny and festive south of Paul do Mar. We get goosebumps with the descent to the vertiginous retreat of Achadas da Cruz. We ascend again and marvel at the final cape of Ponta do Pargo. All this, in the western reaches of Madeira.
Funchal, Madeira

Portal to a Nearly Tropical Portugal

Madeira is located less than 1000km north of the Tropic of Cancer. And the luxuriant exuberance that earned it the nickname of the garden island of the Atlantic can be seen in every corner of its steep capital.
Ribeiro Frio Forest Park, Madeira

Ribeiro Frio Acima, on the Path of Balcões

This region of the high interior of Madeira has been in charge of repopulating the island's rainbow trout for a long time. Among the various trails and levadas that converge in its nurseries, the Parque Florestal Ribeiro Frio hides grandiose panoramas over Pico Arieiro, Pico Ruivo and the Ribeira da Metade valley that extends to the north coast.
Ilhéu de Cima, Porto Santo, Portugal

The First Light of Who Navigates From Above

It is part of the group of six islets around the island of Porto Santo, but it is far from being just one more. Even though it is the eastern threshold of the Madeira archipelago, it is the island closest to Portosantenses. At night, it also makes the fanal that confirms the right course for ships coming from Europe.
Terra Chã and Pico Branco footpaths, Porto Santo

Pico Branco, Terra Chã and Other Whims of the Golden Island

In its northeast corner, Porto Santo is another thing. With its back facing south and its large beach, we unveil a mountainous, rugged and even wooded coastline, dotted with islets that dot an even bluer Atlantic.
Porto Santo, Portugal

Praised Be the Island of Porto Santo

Discovered during a stormy sea tour, Porto Santo remains a providential shelter. Countless planes that the weather diverts from neighboring Madeira guarantee their landing there. As thousands of vacationers do every year, they surrender to the softness and immensity of the golden beach and the exuberance of the volcanic sceneries.
Aldeia da Cuada, Flores Island, Azores

The Azorean Eden Betrayed by the Other Side of the Sea

Cuada was founded, it is estimated that in 1676, next to the west threshold of Flores. In the XNUMXth century, its residents joined the great Azorean stampede to the Americas. They left behind a village as stunning as the island and the Azores.
Graciosa, Azores

Her Grace the Graciosa

Finally, we will disembark in Graciosa, our ninth island in the Azores. Even if less dramatic and verdant than its neighbors, Graciosa preserves an Atlantic charm that is its own. Those who have the privilege of living it, take from this island of the central group an esteem that remains forever.
São Jorge, Azores

From Fajã to Fajã

In the Azores, strips of habitable land at the foot of large cliffs abound. No other island has as many fajãs as the more than 70 in the slender and elevated São Jorge. It was in them that the jorgenses settled. Their busy Atlantic lives rest on them.
Capelinhos Volcano, Faial, Azores

On the trail of the Capelinhos Mistery

From one coast of the island to the opposite one, through the mists, patches of pasture and forests typical of the Azores, we discover Faial and the Mystery of its most unpredictable volcano.
Santa Maria, Azores

Santa Maria: the Azores Mother Island

It was the first in the archipelago to emerge from the bottom of the sea, the first to be discovered, the first and only to receive Cristovão Colombo and a Concorde. These are some of the attributes that make Santa Maria special. When we visit it, we find many more.
Ponta de Sao Lourenco, Madeira, Portugal

The Eastern, Somehow Extraterrestrial, Madeira Tip

Unusual, with ocher tones and raw earth, Ponta de São Lourenço is often the first sight of Madeira. When we walk through it, we are fascinated, above all, with what the most tropical of the Portuguese islands is not.
Levada do Caldeirão Verde, Madeira, Portugal

Upstream, Downstream

It is just one of over a hundred prodigious canal systems that Madeirans built to irrigate crops. Its verdant, steep and dramatic scenery makes visitors to the island flow continuously along the Levada of Caldeirão Verde.
Fanal, Madeira, Portugal

Fanal. A Somehow Surreal Pasture

Irrigated by clouds arriving from the North Atlantic, the lush, green highlands of Fanal are ideal for cattle grazing. Cattle already seem to be part of the magical landscape and not even human incursions like ours seem to affect their routine.
Porto Moniz e Ribeira da Janela, Madeira

A Life of Hillside, Ocean and Lava

We explore lands that are said to have been colonized, back in the 15th century, by the Algarvian Francisco Moniz, the Elder. After almost half a millennium, Porto Moniz became a popular bathing area, largely due to its pools contained in a labyrinth of lava rock.
Residents walk along the trail that runs through plantations above the UP4
City
Gurué, Mozambique, Part 1

Through the Mozambican Lands of Tea

The Portuguese founded Gurué in the 1930th century and, from XNUMX onwards, flooded it with camellia sinensis the foothills of the Namuli Mountains. Later, they renamed it Vila Junqueiro, in honor of its main promoter. With the independence of Mozambique and the civil war, the town regressed. It continues to stand out for the lush green imposing mountains and teak landscapes.
Skipper of one of the bangkas at Raymen Beach Resort during a break from sailing
Beach
Islands Guimaras  e  Ave Maria, Philippines

Towards Ave Maria Island, in a Philippines full of Grace

Discovering the Western Visayas archipelago, we set aside a day to travel from Iloilo along the northwest coast of Guimaras. The beach tour along one of the Philippines’ countless pristine coastlines ends on the stunning Ave Maria Island.
Amboseli National Park, Mount Kilimanjaro, Normatior Hill
safari
Amboseli National Park, Kenya

A Gift from the Kilimanjaro

The first European to venture into these Masai haunts was stunned by what he found. And even today, large herds of elephants and other herbivores roam the pastures irrigated by the snow of Africa's biggest mountain.
Prayer flags in Ghyaru, Nepal
Annapurna (circuit)
Annapurna Circuit: 4th – Upper Banana to Ngawal, Nepal

From Nightmare to Dazzle

Unbeknownst to us, we are faced with an ascent that leads us to despair. We pulled our strength as far as possible and reached Ghyaru where we felt closer than ever to the Annapurnas. The rest of the way to Ngawal felt like a kind of extension of the reward.
by the shadow
Architecture & Design
Miami, USA

A Masterpiece of Urban Rehabilitation

At the turn of the 25st century, the Wynwood neighbourhood remained filled with abandoned factories and warehouses and graffiti. Tony Goldman, a shrewd real estate investor, bought more than XNUMX properties and founded a mural park. Much more than honoring graffiti there, Goldman founded the Wynwood Arts District, the great bastion of creativity in Miami.
Passengers, scenic flights-Southern Alps, New Zealand
Aventura
Aoraki / Mount Cook, New Zealand

The Aeronautical Conquest of the Southern Alps

In 1955, pilot Harry Wigley created a system for taking off and landing on asphalt or snow. Since then, his company has unveiled, from the air, some of the greatest scenery in Oceania.
Moa on a beach in Rapa Nui/Easter Island
Ceremonies and Festivities
Easter Island, Chile

The Take-off and Fall of the Bird-Man Cult

Until the XNUMXth century, the natives of Easter Island they carved and worshiped great stone gods. All of a sudden, they started to drop their moai. The veneration of tanatu manu, a half-human, half-sacred leader, decreed after a dramatic competition for an egg.
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Zapatismo, Mexico, San Nicolau Cathedral
Cities
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Mexico

The Home Sweet Home of Mexican Social Conscience

Mayan, mestizo and Hispanic, Zapatista and tourist, country and cosmopolitan, San Cristobal has no hands to measure. In it, Mexican and expatriate backpacker visitors and political activists share a common ideological demand.
Lunch time
Markets

A Market Economy

The law of supply and demand dictates their proliferation. Generic or specific, covered or open air, these spaces dedicated to buying, selling and exchanging are expressions of life and financial health.
Kente Festival Agotime, Ghana, gold
Culture
Kumasi to Kpetoe, Ghana

A Celebration-Trip of the Ghanian Fashion

After some time in the great Ghanaian capital ashanti we crossed the country to the border with Togo. The reasons for this long journey were the kente, a fabric so revered in Ghana that several tribal chiefs dedicate a sumptuous festival to it every year.
Sport
Competitions

Man: an Ever Tested Species

It's in our genes. For the pleasure of participating, for titles, honor or money, competitions give meaning to the world. Some are more eccentric than others.
Train Fianarantsoa to Manakara, Malagasy TGV, locomotive
Traveling
Fianarantsoa-Manakara, Madagascar

On board the Malagasy TGV

We depart Fianarantsoa at 7a.m. It wasn't until 3am the following morning that we completed the 170km to Manakara. The natives call this almost secular train Train Great Vibrations. During the long journey, we felt, very strongly, those of the heart of Madagascar.
amazing
Ethnic

Amberris Caye, Belize

Belize's Playground

Madonna sang it as La Isla Bonita and reinforced the motto. Today, neither hurricanes nor political strife discourage VIP and wealthy vacationers from enjoying this tropical getaway.

View of Fa Island, Tonga, Last Polynesian Monarchy
Got2Globe Photo Portfolio
Got2Globe Portfolio

Exotic Signs of Life

Willemstad, Curacao, Punda, Handelskade
History
Willemstad, Curaçao

The Multicultural Heart of Curaçao

A Dutch colony in the Caribbean became a major slave hub. It welcomed Sephardic Jews who had taken refuge from the Iberia Inquisition in Amsterdam and Recife. And it assimilated influences from the Portuguese and Spanish villages with which it traded. At the heart of this secular cultural fusion has always been its old capital: Willemstad.
Santiago, island, Cape Verde, São Jorge dos Órgãos
Islands
Santiago, Cape Verde

Santiago from bottom to top

Landed in the Cape Verdean capital of Praia, we explore its pioneer predecessor city. From Cidade Velha, we follow the stunning mountainous ridge of Santiago to the unobstructed top of Tarrafal.
Sampo Icebreaker, Kemi, Finland
Winter White
Kemi, Finland

It's No "Love Boat". Breaks the Ice since 1961

Built to maintain waterways through the most extreme arctic winter, the icebreaker Sampo” fulfilled its mission between Finland and Sweden for 30 years. In 1988, he reformed and dedicated himself to shorter trips that allow passengers to float in a newly opened channel in the Gulf of Bothnia, in clothes that, more than special, seem spacey.
shadow vs light
Literature
Kyoto, Japan

The Kyoto Temple Reborn from the Ashes

The Golden Pavilion has been spared destruction several times throughout history, including that of US-dropped bombs, but it did not withstand the mental disturbance of Hayashi Yoken. When we admired him, he looked like never before.
M:S Viking Tor Ferry-Wrapped Passenger, Aurlandfjord, Norway
Nature
Flam a Balestrand, Norway

Where the Mountains Give In to the Fjords

The final station of the Flam Railway marks the end of the dizzying railway descent from the highlands of Hallingskarvet to the plains of Flam. In this town too small for its fame, we leave the train and sail down the Aurland fjord towards the prodigious Balestrand.
Mother Armenia Statue, Yerevan, Armenia
Autumn
Yerevan, Armenia

A Capital between East and West

Heiress of the Soviet civilization, aligned with the great Russia, Armenia allows itself to be seduced by the most democratic and sophisticated ways of Western Europe. In recent times, the two worlds have collided in the streets of your capital. From popular and political dispute, Yerevan will dictate the new course of the nation.
Miniature houses, Chã das Caldeiras, Fogo Volcano, Cape Verde
Natural Parks
Chã das Caldeiras, Fogo Island Cape Verde

A "French" Clan at the Mercy of Fogo

In 1870, a Count born in Grenoble on his way to Brazilian exile, made a stopover in Cape Verde where native beauties tied him to the island of Fogo. Two of his children settled in the middle of the volcano's crater and continued to raise offspring there. Not even the destruction caused by the recent eruptions deters the prolific Montrond from the “county” they founded in Chã das Caldeiras.    
Visitors at Jameos del Agua
UNESCO World Heritage
Lanzarote, Canary Islands

To César Manrique what is César Manrique's

By itself, Lanzarote would always be a Canaria by itself, but it is almost impossible to explore it without discovering the restless and activist genius of one of its prodigal sons. César Manrique passed away nearly thirty years ago. The prolific work he left shines on the lava of the volcanic island that saw him born.
Earp brothers look-alikes and friend Doc Holliday in Tombstone, USA
Characters
tombstone, USA

Tombstone: the City Too Hard to Die

Silver veins discovered at the end of the XNUMXth century made Tombstone a prosperous and conflictive mining center on the frontier of the United States to Mexico. Lawrence Kasdan, Kurt Russell, Kevin Costner and other Hollywood directors and actors made famous the Earp brothers and the bloodthirsty duel of “OK Corral”. The Tombstone, which, over time, has claimed so many lives, is about to last.
Mangrove between Ibo and Quirimba Island-Mozambique
Beaches
Ibo Island a Quirimba IslandMozambique

Ibo to Quirimba with the Tide

For centuries, the natives have traveled in and out of the mangrove between the island of Ibo and Quirimba, in the time that the overwhelming return trip from the Indian Ocean grants them. Discovering the region, intrigued by the eccentricity of the route, we follow its amphibious steps.
Bride gets in car, traditional wedding, Meiji temple, Tokyo, Japan
Religion
Tokyo, Japan

A Matchmaking Sanctuary

Tokyo's Meiji Temple was erected to honor the deified spirits of one of the most influential couples in Japanese history. Over time, it specialized in celebrating traditional weddings.
Executives sleep subway seat, sleep, sleep, subway, train, Tokyo, Japan
On Rails
Tokyo, Japan

Tokyo's Hypno-Passengers

Japan is served by millions of executives slaughtered with infernal work rates and sparse vacations. Every minute of respite on the way to work or home serves them for their inemuri, napping in public.
Merida cable car, Renovation, Venezuela, altitude sickness, mountain prevent to treat, travel
Society
Mérida, Venezuela

The Vertiginous Renovation of the World's Highest Cable Car

Underway from 2010, the rebuilding of the Mérida cable car was carried out in the Sierra Nevada by intrepid workers who suffered firsthand the magnitude of the work.
Casario, uptown, Fianarantsoa, ​​Madagascar
Daily life
Fianarantsoa, Madagascar

The Malagasy City of Good Education

Fianarantsoa was founded in 1831 by Ranavalona Iª, a queen of the then predominant Merina ethnic group. Ranavalona Iª was seen by European contemporaries as isolationist, tyrant and cruel. The monarch's reputation aside, when we enter it, its old southern capital remains as the academic, intellectual and religious center of Madagascar.
Lion, Elephants, PN Hwange, Zimbabwe
Wildlife
PN Hwange, Zimbabwe

The Legacy of the Late Cecil Lion

On July 1, 2015, Walter Palmer, a dentist and trophy hunter from Minnesota killed Cecil, Zimbabwe's most famous lion. The slaughter generated a viral wave of outrage. As we saw in PN Hwange, nearly two years later, Cecil's descendants thrive.
Napali Coast and Waimea Canyon, Kauai, Hawaii Wrinkles
Scenic Flights
napali coast, Hawaii

Hawaii's Dazzling Wrinkles

Kauai is the greenest and rainiest island in the Hawaiian archipelago. It is also the oldest. As we explore its Napalo Coast by land, sea and air, we are amazed to see how the passage of millennia has only favored it.