GOLDCAR Car Rental at Madeira Airport

At Madeira International Airport the car rental service desks can be found at the arrivals hall, near the security section. Goldcar's car hire desk is open from 7.00 am to midnight, every day of the week. The service team from Goldcar can be contacted by phone on +351 211 451 595, bookings can be made using the form above.

Goldcar is one of several companies providing car rentals at Madeira Airport.

Located close to Funchal are Madeira Botanical Gardens, easily reached via the ER102 road. Opened to the public in 1960, these beautiful parks were once part of the William Reid estate. Reid was the founder of Belmond Reid's Hotel. The park's entrance is at Caminho do Meio, Bom Sucesso in Santa Maria Maior. The park opens at 9.00 am every day, closing at 7.00 pm. Spanning an area of around 8 hectares, the Botanical Gardens are just 3 km distance from Funchal's center. The gardens are home to some 3,000 species of plants from around the world. The sections of the gardens include medicinal plants, topiaries, and a herbarium.

Created in 1994, Funchal Ecologial Park is located some 8 km distance from Funchal, and covers an area of some 10 kilometers square. Varying in altitudes between 470 and 1818 meters above sea level, the park offers visitors numerous activities, such as all-terrain biking, canyoning, paragliding, bird-watching and hiking. An ancient path, the Levada da Negra, follows the route ice-carriers took to an "igloo", where ice blocks were stored in the days before modern refrigeration. Here starts the Poço da Neve hiking trail, which links the Poço da Neve to the regional highway at Laranjal near Santo António. It's a 3 hour hike along some of the island's most breath-taking scenery. The park sits along regional highway 103, and is a home to many endemic species of plants and animals.

Also endemic, but a very much man-made rarity, are the traditional Santana Houses of Madeira. These houses are located in Santana, and aims to show the island's heritage.

Santana is located on the northern coast of Madeira. The small thatched homes were used as homes by man and animal alike, and their peculiarity is that they are very tall and narrow, practically all gable, which gives them a triangular appearance. They have two floors, one for humans, one for animals. Santana sits northwest of Porto da Cruz, and is accessible via the V1 road. Some of these traditional houses can also be seen at the Madeira Theme Park, on the outskirts of Santana. The lovely gardens that surround these houses are planted with many species that are part of the island's medicinal heritage. A permanent exhibition charts the islands' main sources of occupation, such as wine, sugar and tourism. But is also explains the Madeiran archipelago's place in world history in inter-active displays.

If you don't fancy taking the rental car, you can board a bus, the Serviço Inter Urbano nos. 56 and 103 from Funchal.