Madeira: Private Classic Car Tour with Poncha & Cabo Girão

5.00

(166 reviews)

What’s the experience like?

We’d barely squeezed into the old Renault 4L — green as the banana leaves outside — when João grinned at us and asked if we’d tried poncha yet. He said it like it was a rite of passage. We stopped in Câmara de Lobos, this fishing village where everyone seemed to know each other (João waved at three people before we even parked). The bar smelled sharp-sweet from citrus and sugarcane rum. I tried to say “saúde” right but probably botched it — João just laughed and poured another round. That first sip burned a little but warmed me up fast.

The road west curled past tiny houses, all whitewashed with red roofs — sometimes you’d catch banana terraces and tangled grapevines right up against the stone walls. Our classic car rattled over cobbles, which I didn’t mind; it felt like the island was shaking us awake. At one point we passed a woman selling vegetables out of her driveway. She handed João a tomato without saying a word. I still remember how her hands looked — strong, sun-browned.

Cabo Girão came up out of nowhere — just cliffs and then suddenly this glass platform hanging 580 meters above the sea. Standing there made my knees wobble (I mean, you can see straight down to the waves). The wind whipped around us and someone behind me laughed nervously. João told us stories about people growing grapes on impossible slopes below; I can’t imagine how they do it. After that, we stopped at a viewpoint for coffee — not fancy, just plastic chairs and the smell of espresso mixing with sea air. The whole thing felt unhurried, like nobody cared about time except maybe the clouds rolling in.