Parque Ecológico do Funchal

Eight square kilometres of mountain run by the city of Funchal, from 470 m where the Ribeiro do Pisão meets the Levada de Santa Luzia up to the 1,818 m of Pico do Areeiro. The Câmara bought the land in 1918 — it was then the Montado do Barreiro — to catch water for the city, and its springs still supply the upper reaches of the parish of Monte. Much of it was bare at the time, and the replanting that followed was meant to make more water; the ecological park proper was set up in 1994, around nature conservation and environmental education. The point here is the reception centre, the way in.