Where the Sidewalks Are Carpeted with Flowers
April 12th, 2022
Once a year in May, the plant-loving residents of the Portuguese island of Madeira go wild with flowers and stage an event called the Madeira Flower Festival, which features flower-filled parade floats and sidewalks that are carpeted with cut blooms.
One famous scene from Madeira.
It’s a great place for any flower-lover to be on a warm spring day.
Lowee’s Group Tours and I thought local gardeners would relish a chance to see this festival first-hand, so we’re planning a trip next year (2023) to Portugal that includes a full day at the 2023 Madeira Flower Festival.
The 13-day trip, operated by Collette Vacations, will run April 29 through May 11, 2023, and take us to the warm breezes and lush landscapes of Lisbon, the Azorean “green island” of St. Michael, and three days on the island of Madeira.
We start the trip with a flight from Washington’s Dulles airport into Lisbon and spend the first three days discovering Portugal’s capital. Highlights there include sampling Portuguese food and wine, touring historic sites such as the Jeronimos Monastery and Tower of Belem, and traveling to Sintra and the gorgeous Estoril coast on the Riviera, a longtime favorite get-away of Portuguese kings.
Then we fly to the Azores and the island of St. Michael for four days, where we’ll see one of the finest gardens in Europe – the Terra Nostra Botanical Park. While on St. Michael (the largest of the nine volcanic islands that make up the Azores), we’ll do a walking tour of Ponta Delgada, feast on a lunch cooked by volcanic heat in the Furnas Valley, tour a tea plantation and a pineapple plantation, see a pair of crater lakes in which one is blue and one is green, and have an option to go on a whale-watching adventure.
The third leg of the trip flies us to the island of Madeira, the “Pearl of the Atlantic,” where we’ll tour the Madeira Botanical Gardens and enjoy the 2023 Madeira Flower Festival. While on Madeira, we’ll also enjoy a traditional “espetada” open-fire dinner with local folk dancers, tour the picturesque village of Camara de Lobos that was a favorite of Winston Churchill, and drive through the mountains, vineyards, and banana plantations to the fishing village of Porto Moniz, where we’ll have an option to swim in the natural volcanic pools.
Terra Nostra Botanical Park. Credit: Collette Vacations
Then it’s back to Lisbon for a farewell dinner and the flight home.
The trip cost is $5,399 per person double ($6,199 single), which includes airfare, the in-country flights, transportation to and from all airports, all hotel stays and admissions, a Collette tour guide, and 18 meals.
You’re invited.
More information is available by calling Lowee’s Group Tours at 717-657-9658 or toll-free 1-888-345-6933 or by emailing CKelly@Lowees.com. Or see the full itinerary and/or book directly online at Lowee’s website.
See the lineup of 2022 garden trips on my Talks and Trips page.