Start from 36 curated places around Madeira, PT, then choose the recommendations that fit your guests.
Restaurants & cafés
Zarcos - Restaurant & Steakhouse
A neighbourhood steakhouse in the São Gonçalo hillside above the city centre, long-populated by local families who come for the espetada Madeirense — beef cubes on a laurel-wood skewer hung over the table on an iron hook and carved off at the edge. The terrace has a wide-angle view over Funchal bay and the harbour. Order the bolo do caco garlic bread to start.
5 Sentidos - Funchal
A 22-seat bistro tucked behind the La Vie mall in west Funchal, serving carefully sourced Portuguese fish and meat dishes in a room that feels deliberately uncomputerised — handwritten specials board, no reservations, regulars who show up early and nurse a glass at the bar while waiting. The black cod and the tuna steak with caramelised onion are standouts. No walk-in queue system: arrive before the doors open or expect a wait.
Trails & outdoors
PR8 Vereda da Ponta de São Lourenço
Madeira's eastern peninsula is completely unlike the rest of the island — no Laurissilva forest, no levadas, just exposed volcanic rock, low scrub, and cliffs dropping into clear blue water on three sides. The 8.5km round-trip trail runs along the spine of the peninsula to Cais do Sardinha at the far tip, with constant sea views and strong gusts that explain the steel handrails on the narrower sections. AllTrails' highest-rated hike in Madeira.
PR1 Vereda do Areeiro — Pico Ruivo
The most celebrated ridge walk in Madeira, connecting the island's third-highest summit (Pico do Areeiro, 1,818m) to its highest (Pico Ruivo, 1,862m) along a knife-edge path with tunnels, viewpoints, and vertical drop-offs on both sides. The trail is one-way from Pico do Areeiro eastward; you exit at Achada do Teixeira and need to arrange transport back. Allow five to six hours including stops.
Things to do
Blandy's Wine Lodge
A working Madeira wine lodge that has occupied the same 17th-century convent building on Avenida Arriaga for seven generations, ageing wine in oak casks stacked along the original stone corridors in the canteiro method — where the barrels are slowly warmed by the sun through the roof, rather than by heating units. The tour takes you through the ageing cellars and ends with a tasting of two or three wines; the premium tour adds older vintages.
Carreiros do Monte
A wicker toboggan mounted on wooden runners, pushed by two men in white linen and straw hats, sliding 2 kilometres down the steep cobbled lanes from Monte into the lower suburb of Livramento at up to 30km/h. It's been Madeira's most theatrical transport option since the 1850s — the runners don't steer so much as lean and drag boots to slow the descent. A genuine Madeiran experience that has survived precisely because nothing about it is efficient.
Landmarks & sights
Monte Palace Tropical Garden
A 70,000-square-metre terraced garden clinging to the hillside above Funchal, built around a ruined palace and stocked with African cycads, ancient olive trees, koi ponds, and 166 hand-painted azulejo panels narrating the Portuguese age of exploration. The Japanese garden section — complete with pagoda and footbridges — sits at the lowest terrace and is worth taking slowly. Take the cable car from the Funchal seafront to arrive; walking back down via the old cobbled path to Monte village is half the experience.
Mercado dos Lavradores
Funchal's covered market, built in 1940 and still the pulse of the city's food supply chain — vendors in traditional costume sell passion fruit, bird-of-paradise flowers, black scabbardfish, and Madeiran banana varieties you won't see elsewhere. The fish hall in the basement is the real draw: slabs of espada (black scabbardfish) laid out on ice, and tanks of live lobster. Friday mornings bring the most vendors and the best selection.