Monte Palace Tropical Garden

Overview

The Monte Palace Tropical Garden covers the hillside below the church of Monte, the hill village 560 m above Funchal that the cable car reaches in 15 minutes: terraces of exotic trees, ponds and streams, oriental gardens, a collection of azulejo panels telling Portuguese history along the paths, and museums of minerals and African sculpture in the old Monte Palace hotel at the top. It is open daily from 09:30 to 18:00 and takes two hours; the cable car and the wicker toboggans down the hill are the rest of the outing.

Monte was the summer refuge of Funchal’s rich from the 16th century, and its quintas and gardens, its church of 1741 and its tobogganists in straw boaters make it the one excursion every visitor to the island does.

History

The parish was created in 1565 and the wealthy built summer cottages up the hill for the cooler air; the church of Nossa Senhora do Monte, patron of the island, went up in 1741, and the pilgrimage on 15 August climbs its stairs on the knees. The basket cars, sledges of wicker on wooden runners steered by two men, began carrying people down the 3 km to Funchal in the late 19th century, and from 1893 to 1943 a rack railway ran up from the city to Monte and on to Terreiro da Luta at 867 m.

The last Habsburg emperor, Charles I of Austria, died in exile at the Quinta do Monte in 1922 and is buried in the church. The cable car opened almost a century after the railway, 3,718 m long with 560 m of climb from the Almirante Reis park on the seafront, carrying 800 people an hour in eight-seat cabins.

Visiting

Ride up, step out into the garden’s upper entrance and walk down through it: the paths zigzag between tree ferns, cycads, azaleas and proteas past pools of koi, the Japanese garden with its red bridges and pagodas, the lines of tile panels, and the museum in the old hotel with its minerals from Brazil and Africa and its Zimbabwean stone sculpture; the lower gate leaves you near the church.

Climb the church steps, look at the emperor’s tomb and the view over the bay, then decide how to descend: the cable car back, the bus, or the toboggan, 2 km down the streets to Livramento at speed, with the two drivers braking with their boots.

Tips

• Go up before 10:00; the cable car queue on the seafront builds by mid-morning and the garden is empty early.
• The toboggan ends at Livramento, not in the town; it is a 25-minute walk or a bus from there.
• The Botanical Garden has its own cable car from Monte across the João Gomes valley; the two gardens and the ride between them make a full day.
• Bus 20 or 21 from the centre reaches Monte for a fraction of the cable car fare, and is the way back if the queue is long.

Nearby

• Church of Nossa Senhora do Monte: at the garden’s lower gate.
• Funchal Botanical Garden: by cable car across the valley.
• Terreiro da Luta: 2 km uphill.
• Funchal seafront: 15 minutes by cable car.