We have gained a bit of a grasp on Funchal and the neighborhood and it was time to branch out and explore the island.  For our first foray into the hinterlands of Madeira we chose the northwest.  In Madeira there is a series of roads that, taken together, encircle most of the island along the coast.  In addition there are two main roads that cut more or less directly between the south and north coast.  Finally there is a road that goes more or less east and west across the mountainous spine of the island connecting the west coast and the center of the island.  Our plan was to begin the island exploration by driving from the south to the north coast then along the coast to the west until we reached the east-west road and finally east on that road before cutting south, joining the coast road and continuing east to Funchal.  This is a convoluted way of saying we drove around the island's northwest quadrant.

There are two ways to drive the western most north-south route: the quick way on the main road VE 4 that goes under the central mountain spine in a long (over three kilometers) tunnel or old school on ER 228 which goes over the mountains in a never ending series of switchbacks.  We of course chose the scenic mountainous route.  The drive was in fact spectacular in spite of clouds drifting in and out as we approached the top of the pass.  We had planned one short hike on the way up but just as we started it began raining fairly hard and so we retreated back to the car in wet defeat.  Cresting the pass (with a nice overlook) the descent into Sao Vicente was quick and we walked around the town a bit, stopping at one very tall waterfall just on the outskirts.  By this time we were getting pretty hungry and so, from Sao Vicente we turned west through a series of tunnels to our lunch objective, the Marisqueira Pedro do Mar just past the oceanfront town of Seixal.   Craig had earlier identified this restaurant as the pick of the litter in this area and in this instance the research was good.  The restaurant is perched on a hill right on the main road and we sat on a balcony in the back overlooking the ocean where we satisfied our immediate hunger with a starter of bolo da caco (a local bread, looks like a large English muffin and is served sliced and fried in garlic butter...divine) and vinho verde and then dined on beef something (Phyllis) and dorado fish (Craig).  Everything was excellent.

We continued west along the coast to the northwest point of the island, Porto Moniz.  There were several tunnels along the way and some of them actually still had a drivable cliffside almost-two-lane road that was the original pre-tunnel route.  We walked on one of them and then actually drove a second, hoping it went all the way through as a turnaround would be really difficult.  We also stopped at one break in the tunnels to drive down at the Ribeira da Janela to look at a spectacular offshore rock spire, Ilheus da Rib.

At Porto Moniz we walked on the waterfront and watched the ocean waves roll in, mesmerized by the way they crashed up on the jagged rocks just offshore of the town.  Continuing on we went steeply uphill on a one-lane goat road following the directions of our GPS, formerly known as Sheila and now once again renamed "shit gibbon", until we met the east-west ridge road.  We followed that road east until we reached the parking area for the 25 Fontes trailhead.  We had wanted to check this out due to numerous reports that the trail, while beautiful, was way oversubscribed and parking was abysmal.  The reports did not come close to the reality and we determined this "top rated trail" was off our list.  

From here we took a shortcut down to the south coast town of Calheta and then along the coast to Funchal.  It is worth noting that while the south coast is undoubtedly beautiful, you see little of it from the main road as it is a series of tunnels broken only briefly by roundabouts to allow access to the towns below.  Also, if you follow an aberrant GPS you will arrive home still shaken and exhausted as Phyllis did (she honestly feared we might slide backwards down the goat road at one point, and is eternally grateful we chose a greater horsepower car than usual; automatic transmission also helpful).  She needed several stiff drinks to recover.