The #1 rated hike in Madeira on AllTrails is the one that from Pico do Areeiro to Pico Ruivo. These are the two highest peaks on Madeira. And in the middle you pass over Madeira’s 3rd highest peak: Pico das Torres. AllTrails ranks this hike as “Hard” and I think most people who do it would agree. But there’s some serious hype around this trek!
“It’s gonna be the coolest hike of your life” my friend said to me confidently after we landed in Madeira.
“…Like, my life specifically?” **Subtext: “You don’t think I’ve done any other cool hikes?” 🥺
“No, dude, like the coolest hike of anyone’s life.”
When you fly into Madeira—assuming you are coming from Europe, which is undoubtedly the most common flight path—you will fly over this jagged, sun-soaked rocky outcropping. Even from the window of the plane, it seems really long. It makes an impression on you immediately that Madeira is going to be a rocky, mountainous place. Which is true. I had sort of forgotten about this little land formation until I looked at the map on the morning of this hike (I wasn’t responsible for planning this portion of the trip 😂)—it turned out, we would be hiking out to the very end of it!
At the time of our visit, Farol da Ponta de São Lourenço was the 2nd most popular hike in Maderia on AllTrails, which I just found out has this cool map embed feature. So here’s the info from AllTrails: it’s categorized as an “intermediate” hike, and you can probably knock it out in a few hours. There are definitely som very steep stretches of trail, but there are also flatter portions where you can catch your breath. And there is also a little oasis in the middle of it in the form of a cafe! I have no idea how these restock that place.
Our time in Portugal continues! Now we’re going to head to the Lisbon airport and catch a plane to a little-known island off the coast of Africa that… somehow… is still part of Portugal?? It’s called Madeira.
To be perfectly honest, even I—PETER, THE MAP ENTHUSIAST—wasn’t sure where Madeira was when the idea of traveling here was first posed to me. This is why it’s good to plan trips with other adventurous friends: they will push you to places you wouldn’t have otherwise considered! Once we settled on going to Madeira, it turned out that we had quite a few friends who had traveled here before us, so perhaps this island isn’t so “little-known” after all. 🤷🏻♂️
The historic center of Lisbon, predictably, is too dense with beautiful historic buildings to allow for many murals. The truly gorgeous European cities—and Lisbon is definitely one of them!—typically make the most of space in a way that doesn’t leave room for big murals. Street are needs empty walls. So in a city like Lisbon, you have to look outside of the city center.
So the majority of these murals came from neighborhoods called Ajuda (west of the city center) and Graça (just east of the city center).
There is so much history here that it’s tempting to jump down a rabbit-hole, but I think that would actually be sort of a distraction. When I first arrived in Lisbon, although it was clearly rich in history, I spent most of my time just trying to wrap my head around how BEAUTIFUL it is. This is easily one of the most beautiful cities in Europe. I haven’t been everywhere yet, but in terms of raw aesthetics, Lisbon rocketed to the top of my list quite easily, along side places like Amsterdam, Stockholm, and Valletta.
The Greeks really started to invest in and expand Pompeii around 450 BC, but a couple of centuries later, it would ultimately pass into the control of the Roman Empire. By the year 78 AD, it was a large, affluent, well-to-do town in the Roman Empire, which was already more than 3x older than the modern-day United States.
Oh yeah, and it also sat right next to a giant volcano called Mount Vesuvius.
In 79 AD, Vesuvius erupted, releasing approximately 100,000x the energy of the atomics bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WWII COMBINED. At this point in history, the Bay of Naples was already a densely populated area, which made this one of the deadliest eruptions in history. Pompeii, as well as a few other towns in the area, such as Herculaneum, were pretty much wiped off the map, their inhabitants burned and/or suffocated by the violent pyroclastic flows.
Naples takes its calcio (football a.k.a. soccer) seriously. Support for Napoli is almost a religious belief here, and the fact that images of Maradona (the most famous Napoli player ever) outnumber images of Jesus in the streets of Naples can serve as proof of that. But it’s not just Maradona; there are images of the Napoli logo and Napoli players everywhere around Naples.
We’re back with another article set in urban Naples, AND the 2nd-ever showcase of Italian street art! The first took place in Sicily a few years ago, but Naples absolutely crushed Sicily in terms of street art.
Being in beautiful old cities—like those found in Italy—often means less murals. This is because these cities are dense, beautiful, and well-kept—so there’s no empty surfaces for street art. As such, I haven’t yet seen much street art in Northern Italy. However, Southern Italy—being the poorer half of the country—provides a bit more empty space for murals. And Napoli’s unique blend of rich culture and poor economics creates the perfect conditions for Italy the flex its artistic muscles in grittier and more contemporary ways.
Off the Sorrento Peninsula, in the Bay of Naples and the Tyrrhenian Sea, sits the tiny, beautiful island of Capri It may seem like the conversion of places into ~tourist destinations~ is something of a recent phenomenon—like in the last 70 years or so—but there are some places in this world that have attracted tourists for much, MUCH longer.
Capri is one of those places.
In fact, it was functioning as a vacation destination as far back as the ROMAN EMPIRE, likely before the birth of Christ. We actually don’t even know the origin of the name “Capri.” This idyllic isle just is. It’s eternal; immortal. And it’s also one of the rare places in the world where tourism cannot possibly cheapen the destination; it IS the destination.
Naples is the capital of the Italian region of Campania and the 3rd largest city in Italy in terms of population, behind only Roma and Milan. Naples proper has a population of ~909,000 people, and a metro area population of ~3.1 million people, although that figure has been on the decline in recent years. However, the UN projects that starting this year the population is expected to enter a new period of growth. So, the punchline is, Naples is a big city. Especially in the context of Italy. Honestly, I would have guessed that the population would be more than this. It feels quite overwhelming when you’re in the middle of it.
