On the second day in Madeira, our goal was to hike the Verada da Ponta de São Lourenço Hiking Trail, also known as PR 8. All the main trails on Madeira are shortly named by a PR number. This specific trail is located on the easternmost tip of the island. There are some spectacular views over the cliffs and of course the main goal, the tip of the peninsula where you can get an amazing areal view over the peninsula and actually most of the eastern island. Mostly Madeira is lush and green apart from this region, it looks more like a desert. It is also the dryest place in Madeira.
I will make this a 2 part post because there is too much content for a single post.
This is a 6.5km hike in total and takes about 5 hours to complete on average. In terms of difficulty, id say it sits somewhere in the middle. There is no crazy altitude change but has some pretty steep sections that might be hard for some.
Shortly into this trail, you see amazing cliffsides and seascapes.
It is one of the most popular trails on this island so you have to expect some crowds but it wasn't that bad. Fortunately, there is plenty of room to pass people.
After crossing any hill you get a new landscape visible so this trail definitely doesn't get boring. Soon, we arrived at our first checkpoint. An extremely spectacular cliffside and viewpoint Miradouro de São Lourenço, we stayed there for a bit to appreciate the view we had. You can easily tell that these rocks are of volcanic origin. Madeira once was a very volcanically active island but it was a long time ago, now it's silent but the evidence are still there.
Having taken some shots and selfies, it was time to move forward. We had to climb up a pretty steep hill but at the same time got to see more of these awesome sights.
This is how our trail looked.
We were quite high up on the cliff and we already got some sick views over this peninsula.
This thin section had to be crossed, a vertical 70m drop on either side.
In the middle of the valley is a small building that really stands out, Ponta de São Lourenço Experience. It Is surrounded by many beautiful green palm trees. A small green spot in the middle of the otherwise dry desert.
This is actually a cafe.
We got closer and took a better look at this place. It is actually a cafe but was closed at the time we got there. We were pretty late into the day and this cafe is only open during the busiest hours on this trail. For sure a unique scenery.
It was time to get up the highest hill of our hike, the Miradouro Ponta do Furado which was also the main goal we had to reach, the tip of the peninsula. It was the longest incline and was pretty tiring. Look at the trail we had to get up to.
When we finally got up there, the view was totally worth the hike. You could see in every direction and the view was magnificent.
This is as far as we could go by foot, there were a couple of islands in front of us and to westernmost of these had a lighthouse( Farol da Ponta de São Lourenço) on it. In another, future post I have more photos of this lighthouse when I drove past it with a ship.
Up there were huge amounts of lizards that roamed around.
One decided to climb into my camera bag.
Dramatic view of Madeira's central island.
This is where part 1 ends. I have some more epic shots of our walk back that I will share in Part 2. I will also show you some plants that grow in this dry area of the island and of course a nice sunset when we were close to finishing our hike. Stay tuned!
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