The Vine hotel manager tells us all about her favourite places.
MY FAVOURITE PLACE IN MADEIRA? ALL OF THEM!!!
I have travelled a lot over the past 30 years owing to my job, always in relation to tourism.
Returning to Madeira always gives off that feeling of comfort and relief one feels coming home.
The warmth, light, shades of green, gradations of blue and grey in the ocean, the pink and orange of each sunset.
It is hard to come up with a single place because my mind just keeps jumping over to several others. The luxurious green of Chão dos Louros, with the mountain outlined by straight lines that betray the existence of the levadas, the colourful slopes of Caniçal, with the deep blue of the Atlantic that surround it as a quilt adorned with the white of the waves crashing against the rocks.
The sound of the wind, the fragrance of the sea, the flight of the seagulls and the shearwater, alternating between being suspended in the air and diving into the azure at an astonishing speed. The natural pools at Doca do Cavacas that bring to mind the smell of salt in one's hair, the sweet taste of ice cream, the crystal-clear freshness of the water, the pins for picking sea snails off their shells in the ever-happy Summers of my childhood memories. I have always been amazed by the gliding down of the clouds along the mountain slopes, as though an ethereal flock. A happy and blue sky in the south of the island stands out against the darkness of the high clouds, loaded with rainwater that seem to want to break out upon landing in some of the highest peaks.
But the best of all the Madeiras is the one that has people in it. The Madeira of the folk festivals, of the 'nativity masses', of the walks along the levadas, the picnics in the mountain. Madeira is not sim ply a landscape built of contrasts, it is much more than that. It is a family that waits for us with open arms, an open smile, with a genuine accent, open doors, a glass of poncho in-hand, ready to share its famous espetada skewered meat and bolo do caco flatbread and that heartfelt hug, so typical of Madeira, followed by a tap on the shoulder as though to say: welcome home!
Teresa Gonçalves
