Rare Adventures

Author: Janner Boy

Top Highlights from Our 4×4 Tour of Madeira’s Stunning Coastline

We only had a few days on the island and wanted to see what it was all about. An investigation into the options through Tripadvisor threw up options for trips in all directions around the island.

it was tempting to do something like canyoning or mountain biking, but it was pointed out by Wooksie that it was hardly her idea of a relaxing weekend, so we agreed to do the full day 4×4 tour of west Madeira with a company called Safari Madeira.

The company were pretty good. The truck was full (8 people) so a bit crammed but you expect that on a 4×4 adventure, the one criticism I would make is that they should have been clearer on the need to wear WARM clothing, at times it was freezing in an open top vehicle going over mountains.

Full-Day Jeep Safari West – Porto Moniz – Seixal – Cabo Girão

Porto Moniz

First stop was Porto Moniz, the little village where the fleet of little boats which fish for the Scabbards live, nice stop for an early cup of coffee and a stroll around the streets. Unfortunately the fishing fleet was out to sea so we didn’t get to see all the colourful boats.

Cabo Girao skywalk

Next stop were mighty cliffs of Cabo Girao where they have a skywalk, a glass floor, bridging the gap in the walkway between the cliffs. Unfortunately, we arrived at about the same time as a coach from a cruise ship so walking around on a glass floor with a load of overweight Americans made it a less than terrifying experience, although their combined weight was probably the biggest risk when walking around the gantry.

It was at this point Wooksie and I considered pushing loads of the Yanks off the cliff as a protest at tariffs, the plan became quite well developed at one point but then it was time to leave.

Then we headed up into the mountains and the off road adventure, it was bouncy and fun to be honest, but the main use of the 4×4 power was just getting up and down the steep roads not through the mud. It felt like being in a rodeo standing up in the back of the truck, but the novelty soon wore off as it was bloomin’ freezing !

Paraque Florestal

We traveled over the mountains, through the clouds and ultimately above them to get to Fanal, where there were more huge cliffs but they were unfortunately covered in clouds, that took the edge off the scenery.

It was at this point that the passengers in the truck started to rebel. The cold mountain air in an open truck became unbearable and the Joao, the helpful driver in a thick warm jumper, noticed the blue lips of his passengers and offered to shut the roof, and not surprisingly, we all agreed.

I even did the trek to the top of the cliffs in an attempt to warm up, you will probably notice that the other people in these photos are much better prepared than us, Madeira Safaris please note. Even Wooksie climbed to the top of the cliffs, she doesn’t like to be beaten and she was still blaming me for her not having jeans on.

Seixal

We then dropped down into the spectacular Seixal seaside town where the spectacular volcanic scenery reaches the sea and the water turns a spectacular pale blue as the waves smash into the cliffs

The locals have been very innovative in creating rock pools between the various rocky outcrops to create a spectacular array of swimming pools, some of them are a lot more dangerous and “refreshing” than the others. It is a lovely place to have lunch, luckily Madeira Safaris didn’t say anything about bringing swimming gear either, which I was secretly grateful about because I was only just warming up and didn’t fancy another freezing experience.

Mighty waterfalls

Then it was back to Funchal. Firstly along the north coast road and turning south through the centre of the island and passing through super steep valleys surrounded by huge volcanic mountains that were surprisingly green and covered in stunning vegetation.

But not before being doused by a huge waterfall that nobody mentioned, there were lots of them around the Seixal area and made for some spectacular views.

07/05/2025
Discover Madeira: A Springtime Adventure

I’d been told years ago that if you want to go to Madeira, do it in the spring because it is colourful. Invariably, I’d notice Madeira at some other time of the year and would make a mental note that I needed to remember to go there in the spring, and then forget.

This year I remembered and last week we finally made it to the island. This is a quick summary of what we found that will hopefully be helpful to others.

So in general, there are loads of things to do when you get away from Funchal, hotels are cheap, beer and food is very reasonable and if you are lucky, you too will bump into an old mate from Plymouth on the plane and get the chance to investigate the bars together.

The weather. I was watching the forecast in the week leading up to the flight and noticed that it seemed to be a bit chilly, and indeed it was. I’ve been to Portugal a few times and the weather has never lived up to the hype and the same applies to Madeira. When the sun was out it was lovely, as soon as the clouds appeared I might has well been in the UK. I’m hardy soul when it comes to cold but I was glad to have a jumper, so if you go in spring expect to take a coat.

Funchal is a concrete jungle, as bad or worse than the Canaries or the mainland. It stretches along the coast to the west away from the centre for 2 or 3 miles and then it suddenly stops and starts to become rural, but they are still building so it will only get bigger. The hotels are more upmarket than say, the Canaries, they are nearly all 4* and a lot more individual in design, they are also cheaper, you should be able to find a 4* with breakfast for about £100 per night.

Once you get out of Funchal the scenery is stunning and it feels like a totally different world.

Steep and colourful – the whole island is steep as it pops out of the sea and is well over 1000m high, so wherever you go expect to be walking up or down a hill, many of which are not for the faint hearted. People who just stay around their hotels in Funchal will never see or experience the things this island has to offer.

There is a really vibrant tourism industry specialising in a whole range of activities from hiking to canyoning that take advantage of the islands natural beauty and gradients, we explored the west of the island on the 4×4 truck tour and it was fantastic. We regretted that we did not have more time to try some of the more adrenaline filled events, but that’s life.

Ugly sea food, they have the best sea food selection of any place I had stayed. The restaurants are full of locally caught fish and it is very cheap. They also have the ugliest fish I have ever eaten, but fortunately it also happens to be the best tasting fish I have had the pleasure to eat – the local name is Scabbardfish and they live in a 1000m of water off the coast, absolutely lush.

06/05/2025
My weight loss journey: 7 Years of Transformation

As my youngest daughter pointed out, I’ve probably had an extra 10 years of life thanks to the weight loss.

This graph tracks my weight from the start of the journey in Episode 1 back in 2017, to where I am today. As you can see, it has been a bit of a roller coaster with lots of ups and downs.

I never expected to maintain it the mid 13 stone lower levels but I have managed to keep it within a reasonable boundary in the mid 14 stones, which was roughly 2 stone lighter than my norm before I started so that has been really good.

Click here to follow the rest of My Weight Loss Journey

This has had a radical impact on my life, I have been absolutely amazed what abuse the body of a 60 something can take, just keep pushing it as far as it will go but listen carefully to what you body is saying.

7 years ago I was a workaholic, in 2018 I became a sort of dietaholic, and then moved on to being a sort fitnessaholic which gave me an overall much better worklife balance and helped me along the road to retirement.

Being lighter made me so much happier, I always hated tight cloths so being able to walk around in smaller sizes and not having them stretching the seems was great for self confidence.

But I lived in fear of putting the weight back on, and going back to the bigger me and having to go through the battle to lose weight, I didn’t want to have to do that again as it felt like a one off experience.

You have to watch your calorie consumption constantly if you have an appetite for food and beer like mine. In the graph you can see the drops, that is normally after a holiday or there is a particular challenge coming up and I start calorie counting, that tends to focus the mind on what you are eating, you avoid the snacks and know the cost of alcohol so don’t do it – or at least make the right choices.

The company team entered the 10km together for charity, it was a first time for all of us

I am constantly setting targets, I hated running but decided to do the Bristol 10km as a challenge, I ended up running 10km twice a week and eventually did a half marathon.

During Covid, I used the time to cycle. I cut down on the mountain biking as I guessed I wouldn’t be popular in hospital if I had a crash, so started doing longer rides, 50km, then 100km and finally 100 miles in a day – these were tough but so glad I’ve done them, and all of them on my own without support of a group.

Running a half marathon distance, on my own was a massive adrenalin rush.

In fact, I then found out the qualifying time of the GB Over 60 Triathlon team run and managed to achieve it in a 5km sprint, at this point I decided I had to stop somewhere at that was it.

The day I cracked the sub 25 min 5km at 61, on a wet January afternoon, just for fun !

I had my hip replaced last year after I smashed it on a mountain bike fall in France, but within 2 weeks I was back in the gym, 4 weeks did 50km on the bike and 6 weeks I was back playing football because if you keep yourself fit and have reasonable control of your weight there is surprisingly few things you can’t do and overcome.

Up and about straight after the op, walking without crutches after a week and back in the gym after a month!

So that’s it, after the diet you need to find your equilibrium and focus on staying in that zone.

I am normally about 14st 8lb now, I’m happier a few pounds less but if I start to go too much above it then it is time to start calories counting again !

See the rest of my Weight loss journey posts.

30/04/2025
My weight loss journey: Myth busters
The key lessons from my 7 years of managing my weight

I learned a lot from doing Man v Fat, we all did really well, losing 10-20% of our weight over 4 months. It was lots of fun but very competitive as well.

Click here to follow the res of My Weight Loss Journey

The basic principle is that our bodies are machines that need fuel.

Calories in (food) v Calories out (exercise) = weight

Too much input and the body stores it for a rainy day, too much output and the body calls on its reserves to survive and burns the fat. We are still Mk 1 human beings and our bodies know how to survive, they just don’t know too much about modern living and junk food !

To lose weight you have to reduce incoming and increase outgoing. Trying to lose weight just on exercise is very very hard, 1lb in weight is 3500 calories, so to lose 1lb through exercise you need to do 7 x 500kcal sessions in the gym, or walk up Snowdon once a week (roughly what I burned doing that).

So basically this is a calorie burning project, there are lots of ways to do it, diets, exercise, fasting – loads of options, but the only thing that matters is reducing input and increasing output.

A few common things that I’ve learned to dismiss.
1. A male needs 2500 per day – not convinced about this one. We are all different and if I took in 2500 every day I’d be the size of an elephant, and I do loads of exercise.
2. Muscle turns to fat – nope, it turns to flab, which is different, it can be rebuilt, this is why athletes use steroids, once a muscle has been grown, it can always go back to the maximum size.
3. Turn fat in muscle – nope, burn off the fat, it cant turn into muscle, that needs protein and fibre.
4. Muscle burns calories faster – this is actually true but if you start doing weights you will get heavier so this is something for 3 months down the track. I’ve got mates who are the literal muscle brick shit houses and they do burn calories but they are unique. We don’t want minor weight gains in muscles affecting your weight downward trend.
Your action plan

So what we need is the tools to manage our calories, so here goes
1. Get the myfitnesspal app – this is where you log your food and it also pulls in the data from your exercise tracker to work out your daily score.
2. Exercise tracker – you can do this on a phone but it is much better with a watch that is counting steps and importantly heart rate. I’ve got a Garmin because of the other sports, but Apple and the others are just as good.
3. Linking the two can be a bit of a faff because it involves personal data permissions but stick with it.
So for the first week, get the tools set up and you can start tracking your food intake.

Food intake – don’t get bogged down in being too precise, I spend about 2 minutes a day on this max. Most of the food we eat is available in the tracker, it’s just working out the portion sizes.
28/04/2025
Spring in the Forest of Dean: Mountain Biking starts here

So it’s time to put away the winter toys, snowboarding is over for another year along with dark nights and cold days.

It’s such a great moment when I flash up the camper, load up the mountain bike and head for the hills. I’ve got a lot of fun planned for the summer. A trip to Scotland and the northern England trails with my mate Northern Bloke, then down to France in June to ride the trails around our apartment with Miniboy.

First trip of the year was to the Forest of Dean which is about 40 miles away. I absolutely love driving there, it’s a chance to crank up the stereo in the van and bash out inappropriate basey music for a man of my age and remember that I am living my dream.

It was a warm day and I took the electric mountain bike. There are some tough climbs over there and no point in making life more difficult with my normal bike. In truth I ride it on the minimum power settings so I maximise the exercise, but on those nasty bits that defeat my old legs I get to avoid the walk of shame.

After weeks of dry weather, the trails were in perfect condition and plenty of grip, so it was a fun day all round until a niggle injury to my knee stopped play after a couple of hours and some fantastic downhill rides.

This is the video of the Launchpad run, absolutely made the day

It is a sign of my increasing maturity that I decided to give it a miss when the knee started to hurt, and nothing to do with the attraction of a warm sunny day and a cold beer in the camper fridge !

24/04/2025