The subtropical archipelago of Madeira is a “well-preserved paradise” now being discovered anew, said Henry Alford in The New York Times. In times past, the Portuguese island colonies were mainly considered an escape from the dreary skies of the British Isles, attracting such elderly—and pale—gents as Winston Churchill and George Bernard Shaw. In recent years, however, the volcanic islands have welcomed a younger generation of travelers, lured by dramatic landscapes, “year-round spring-like weather,” and a nightlife that keeps going even after the sun rises.
After a two-hour flight from Lisbon, I was en route to my hotel outside Madeira’s capital, Funchal. Perched atop a soaring sea cliff, Ponta do Sol is a “wonderfully hip, James Bond–like aerie” accessed via an outdoor elevator that leads up to a suspended catwalk. The window in my room looked out over the deep-blue Atlantic glistening in the sun. Soon I was in a car winding my way through the main island’s many microclimates. This is the only place in the world with ancient forest that dates to the Ice Age, and I found myself confronted with one amazement after another: “a lush, rain-forest-like scrum of ferns; a hushed meeting of pines; a spray of birds of paradise.” Returning to my hotel, I felt as if I had finished a long trip to several destinations, rather than spent a single afternoon on a single island.
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