The festival is a week of guided outdoor activities put on across the whole island by the regional tourist board, and you sign up for them one at a time rather than buying a ticket to the festival. Levada walks and mountain hikes are the bulk of the programme, alongside canyoning, coasteering, mountain biking, trail running, paragliding, kayaking, diving and boat trips, with a few concerts staged on the peaks at sunrise. Every activity has its own meeting point, its own grade and its own cap on numbers.
- CostMost of the programme is free. The rest is charged at cost by the operator running it, and you register per activity rather than paying anything to the festival itself.
- WhereAll over the island, not in one place: the peaks above Funchal, the levadas of the north, the laurel forest in the centre and the water off the west and south coasts.
- Getting thereA few activities lay on transport from a pick up point and say so in the listing. For the rest you need a car: trailheads are not on bus routes and a taxi to one will not be waiting when you come out.
- Best timeRegister the day the programme opens. The popular walks and the sunrise slots are gone within hours of going live, and there is no waiting list.
- With childrenThe easy graded walks and the sea outings take them. Canyoning, coasteering and the harder mountain routes set a minimum age, which is on the listing before you book.
- If it rainsWalks go ahead in cloud, which at that altitude is normal rather than bad weather. The sea trips and the canyoning are what gets cancelled, and you are told on the morning.
Booking is the event. The programme goes up a few weeks beforehand, the good slots fill in a day, and a visitor who waits until they land is choosing from what nobody else wanted. Pick a second and a third choice at the same time, and read the meeting point before you book anything: the island is small on a map and slow on the road, and a walk on the north coast can be an hour and a half from where you are sleeping. The guiding is what you are signing up for rather than the route, because the levadas and the peaks are open, free and walkable on any other day of the year.
What people ask us about the Nature Festival
How do I book an activity?
Each one is registered separately on the programme the regional tourist board publishes a few weeks beforehand. There is no pass and no ticket covering the festival as a whole, so sign up for every activity you want individually, and expect the popular ones to have gone within a day of the programme opening.
Do I need my own gear?
For the walks, yes: boots with grip, a waterproof and your own water are on you, and trainers are not enough on wet basalt. Canyoning, coasteering, biking and diving come with the equipment as part of the activity, and the operator says what to bring on top of it.
Are the guides in English?
The groups are mixed and the guides work in Portuguese and English. Where an activity is more talk than walking, the listing says which language it is led in, so check that one before you book it.
Is it worth planning a trip around?
It is worth planning a week around if you want a guide into places that are awkward or unsafe to reach alone, and if you like doing that in a group. The island itself is open all year, so a trip that misses the dates misses the company and the organisation rather than the landscape.
