Madeira is the island of the eternal spring. This place became a well-known European resort yet in the XIX century. Madeira is a place where celebrities, lords and kings come to have some rest.
The island is located in the Atlantic Ocean. Its distance from Madeira to mainland Europe (Portugal is the closet one) is about 1000 km. The distance to Africa is around 700 km. The person who had discovered Madeira was Joao Goncalves Zarco. In 1419 he landed on this island while escaping from a huge storm. In those days the island was completely covered by impenetrable forests and this fact gave the name to the island as "Madeira" means "a tree, a forest". Near this island are located other islands of the archipelago - Porto Santo and several wild uninhabited islands like Selvagens and Desertas. Both islands are turned into nature reserves.
Continue reading
This article about Madeira is written by the orangesmile.com editorial team and is protected by the copyright law. The article can only be re-used with a direct link to www.orangesmile.com