Wicker toboggan ride

Wicker toboggan ride in Funchal, Madeira, Portugal

The Madeiran wicker taboggan ride is among the 7 of the world's coolest commutes, according to CNN (February 23, 2015).

Although more tourists than locals now use this unusual form of transport, visitors to Madeira can still see the odd businessman being guided down the city's hills to work, says CNN.

The wicker sledges and their rubber-soled pushers first appeared in the 19th century, when locals invented the mode of transport as a way of getting to Madeira's city center from the hilltop district of Monte.

Today this one-mile journey remains the most popular route on the system.

The scenic islands of Madeira

The famous big wave surfer Garrett McNamara visits the scenic islands of Madeira.

With views like Hawaii and portuguese food and hospitality, Garret gets the best of both worlds with his local contacts, artist Marco Fagundes and local surfer/tour guide Orlando Pereira.

In beautiful Madeira, Garrett experiences fresh tuna just off the boat, rides a couch down a hill and tries the exquisite local, aged Madeira wine.

More videos on Madeira:
Madeira Islands on Travel Channel
10 reasons to visit Madeira Islands 
Introducing Madeira Islands (2012)
Lush island filled with treasures (Daily Mail) 
The Island (teaser)
Madeira as it was in 1951 
Nature & adventure in Madeira
Wicker basket toboggan riding
Madeira goodies
Madeira Islands: all year round
Aerial view of Jardim do Mar in Southwest Madeira 
Calheta municipality (including Jardim do Mar): Southwest of Madeira
World famous footboller Cristiano Ronaldo was born in Madeira (Daily Mail) 
Madeira explored by mountainbiker David "G-RAF"
The folk song of Madeira Islands: Bailinho da Madeira
Community typical dance in a popular feast (Jardim do Mar)
Hiking from Jardim do Mar to Prazeres and Paúl do Mar  
Madeira Islands: photo video

Carnival of Madeira 2014: programme

This year the Carnival events will take place between February 25 and March 5, 2014.

The Carnival of Madeira (Carnaval in Portuguese) is an annual festival held forty days before Easter, that ends on Shrove Tuesday (called Fat Tuesday in Madeira - Terça-feira Gorda in Portuguese) the day before Ash Wednesday (first day of Lent).

Here is the programme.

Street Events:
From the Wednesday before Carnival allow yourself to be captivated by the magic of Carnival in Funchal city centre, especially the central walkway of Avenida Arriaga, which becomes the focus for numerous street events including carnival music, performances, pageants and events of various kinds that contribute to rousing the carnival spirit in tourists and residents alike.

Children's Carnival:
The morning of the Friday before Carnival is given over to children. A thousand of so young carnival goers from various schools and kindergartens in Funchal, all in costume, parade through the city centre (Avenida Arriaga), where they are entertained with carnival fun.

Solidarity Carnival:
On the afternoon of the Friday before Carnival, the city centre is again the scene of another highly original and creative event. With an energy that sweeps everybody along with it, hundreds of carnival goers from the Funchal Community Development Association parade along Avenida Arriaga to the Municipal Gardens, where they perform a show in which they are the leading players.

Parade of Floats:
On Saturday night the centre of Funchal is thronged with thousands of tourists and residents who come to watch the parade of floats, one of the major attractions of the Madeira Carnival. Over a thousand participants spread between ten groups and a dozen floats parade to the sound of carnival music, all of them choreographed and rehearsed beforehand and dressed in eye-catching costumes, radiating an unbeatable enthusiasm that gets everyone going.

"Trapalhão" Parade:
On the Tuesday of Carnival everyone is free to display their originality. Carnival goers come out spontaneously onto the streets in fancy dress, mostly grotesque or caricatured, to take part individually or in groups in a typically Madeiran informal parade in which humour and social satire about regional, national or international events form the inspiration for the throngs of participants.

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More info:
History and traditions of Carnival in Madeira
Carnival of Madeira

Nature & Adventure in Madeira

(video direct link)

Nature & Adventure activities (Active Tourism) are extra reasons to visit Madeira Islands. On land, on air or on sea, the choices are plenty and everybody can experience activities, offering a multiplicity range, designed for all age groups.

Particularly in CALHETA municipality territory (Southwest), where Jardim do Mar is located, you can do all: hiking, mountain biking, surf, bodyboard, wind surfing, diving, climbing, canyoning, paragliding, sailing, dolphin & whale watching or (big game) fishing.

CALHETA, besides its breathtaking landscapes and the friendly local people, has the best weather conditions all year round.

It is not the first time we hear someone saying that the impressive landscape is similar to Jurassic Park island ("pretty similar to the Jurassic Park island", it is said on the this video). We have also heard comparisons to New Zealand type landscapes.

All that in Europe and with good climate.

Come and feel the landscape around you. Dive in it.Take a deep breath. Surrender to the charms of an island that exhales energy and inspires emotion and adventure.

Besides all this, you may also feel Madeira's Nature profound and empowering quietness, working as a self (relaxing and healing) retreat from modern life rush, stress and anxieties.

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Related info:
NATURE/ECO Tourism & Madeira & Sofia's Place

Whales outside Jardim do Mar

Jardim do Mar 2012

Please, click on picture to enlarge

http://www.lobosonda.com/

Dolphins just outside Jardim do Mar

Jardim do Mar 2012

Please, click on picture to enlarge

(Photo copyright: unknown)

Carnival in Madeira

Carnival parade 2011 in Madeira

Carnival is lived with quite intensity by people in Funchal, the Islands's capital. Traditionally there are two Carnival parades in Madeira, and they are very different from each other.

The most important one, the allegoric parade, which takes place always on the Saturday of the Carnival weekend, is the more sophisticated one and needs a great deal of commitment and organisation from all the groups and the people involved.

Numerous Samba groups with thousands of participants in magnificent and colourful costumes dance to electrifying Samba music through the streets of Funchal, spreading an ambiance evoking the Carnival of Rio. It can be criticised precisely because of following the Rio's Carnival... It could be (more) original and based on Madeiran own Carnival traditions.

The second parade, called "trapalhão", traditionally floods the streets of the city centre with thrilling joy on "Mardi gras" (Tuesday ending the Carnival period). In this parade everybody can take part and the – sometimes quite daring – costumes and depicted caricatures are left to the participants' own imagination.

At least one month before the Carnival peak time the best-known and established Carnival groups visit the hotels and entertain the guests with dance and music performances.

Wicker basket toboggan riding

The Monte toboggan ride to Funchal downtown is perhaps one of the most famous of Madeira's tourist attractions.

Originally a fast means of transport down to Funchal for people living in Monte, these toboggan sledges appeared around 1850. Adventurous, yet safe, an ‘old-fashioned’ toboggan ride to make your way down from Monte.

It is one of those things that you simply must do when visiting Madeira. Indeed, the renown American author, Ernest Hemingway, wrote of his journey in the wicker basket toboggan sledge as the "most exhilarating experience" of his life.

And, it is true, you are unlikely to find a similar experience anywhere else on your worldly journeys.

The downhill journey to Funchal is made in about 10 minutes on a total course of 2 km, reaching at times a speed of 48 km/hour.

Still in use today, they attract thousands of tourists every year who want to make this exciting experience of sliding at high speed on narrow, winding streets down to Funchal. These two-seater wicker sledges glide on wooden runners, pushed and steered by two men traditionally dressed in white cotton clothes and a straw hat, using their rubber-soled boots as brakes.



Info from www.madeira-web.com and www.love-madeira.com