Low-anchored clouds gather around Madeira’s volcanic mountains, drifting between the peaks, settling into deep valleys, wrapping the ancient forests in soft, shifting veils of mist. For a few precious days, Neil and I are living amongst them, in a stone cottage tucked into the mountainside, surrounded by the extraordinary green world of the Laurisilva.
There is something enchanting about living within the clouds. It has been said that I live life with my head in the clouds. A daydreamer, yes, that much is true. They come and go as they please, sometimes gathering so closely that the mountains disappear altogether, sometimes lifting to reveal a landscape transformed by sunlight. The changes can be astonishingly sudden. One moment we are walking through a cool, vapour drenched forest, our hair and skin damp with mist; the next, we emerge into brilliant sunshine, as though we have stepped through an invisible veil into another world.
Yet the clouds are doing far more than creating atmosphere. They are part of the living fabric of this ancient forest, bringing moisture to a landscape where water moves in countless ways, some visible, others hidden from sight.
From cloud to leaf, from leaf to moss, from moss to root, the water makes its way through a world of extraordinary relationships.
The Laurisilva is a remnant of the subtropical laurel forests that once extended across parts of southern Europe and the Mediterranean region, before climatic changes transformed those landscapes. Here, on Madeira, the ocean and mountains have helped preserve something of that ancient green world.
At Fanal, we rested against the great, fissured trunks of venerable til trees, Ocotea foetens, their sprawling branches bearing the weight of centuries. Mosses softened the bark, ferns found footholds in crevices, lichens spread across surfaces where moisture lingered. Looking upwards, it seemed that whole forests were growing within the trees themselves, miniature landscapes suspended amongst the branches.
Leaning against one of these ancient giants, I felt a deep sense of comfort and connection. Its great trunk seemed to receive me gently, accommodating the contours of my back as though it were holding me. My blood sugar had fallen, leaving me feeling vulnerable, and the quiet reassurance of the tree was especially welcome.
Around us, however, there was precious little quiet.
Groups of visitors called loudly to one another, their camera phones grazing the landscape, gathering photographs and selfies beneath the ancient branches. I found myself thinking of the cattle that now graze amongst these venerable trees, and wondering which of the two herds was more unsettling.
Of course, I was taking photographs too. And how could I possibly know whether others held the same wonder in their hearts, or perceived the beauty before them through the lenses of their phones? What troubled me was not their presence, but the apparent lack of consideration for others sharing this extraordinary place. My own difficulties were invisible to them, and as people pressed through the crowds, I quietly moved away, seeking space amongst the trees.
There was litter too, including discarded toilet tissue, an uncomfortable reminder of how carelessly we humans sometimes move through places of extraordinary natural significance.
I felt sorrow for the trees, for the forest that once surrounded them, and for the fragile communities of living things sheltered within their ancient forms.
And yet, leaning there, held against the cool, moss-softened bark, I felt something else too. A sense of belonging, however fleeting, to a living world immeasurably older than my own.
I found myself wondering about the lives these trees have known.
Long before the levadas carried water across the mountains, before roads, fields and grazing cattle interrupted the forest, these trees belonged to a more extensive, interconnected woodland. Their canopies would have gathered moisture from passing clouds, their roots drawn nourishment from the volcanic earth, while generations of birds, insects, fungi and other organisms lived and died within their shelter.
Perhaps bats found sanctuary in their hollows and deep fissures, emerging at dusk to hunt diverse populations of insects. Perhaps the endemic trocaz pigeons, whose lives remain so closely entwined with the Laurisilva, settled amongst their branches, feeding upon fruits and carrying the promise of future forests within them.
How many seasons have these trees witnessed? How many clouds have passed through their crowns?
Today, cattle graze beneath some of Fanal’s ancient trees, where a more continuous forest once stood. There is beauty in their sculptural forms, standing apart in the open landscape, but also something poignant about the spaces between them. Their surviving presence speaks of endurance, while the surrounding grassland tells another part of the story.
Elsewhere, walking beside a levada, we found ourselves immersed in the dense green embrace of the forest.
The path was narrow, the terracotta earth slippery beneath our feet, and at times the ground fell away precipitously beside us. Occasionally, we balanced along the concrete edge of the water channel itself, proceeding with careful, considered steps.
For me, with my unreliable sense of balance, this was an exercise in vestibular rehabilitation as much as exploration. But there was no need to hurry. Every few metres, something drew us to a halt.
A fern unfolding from a moss-covered bank. The intricate branching forms of lichens. Delicate fungi emerging from decaying wood. Feathered green fronds, glistening with moisture, so finely divided that they seemed almost too fragile to belong to the material world.
I reached out to touch the mosses, gently exploring their cool, yielding textures, reading with my fingertips some of the beauty that my eyes could no longer fully resolve.
The forest invited this closer kind of noticing.
And always, there was water.
Where fallen leaves and stones interrupted the levada’s flow, it gurgled and hurried, its voice carrying through the stillness. Yet along the smooth, sunlit stretches, it moved almost silently, slipping past like liquid mercury.
The contrast fascinated me. The same water, travelling along the same channel, sometimes announcing its presence with a lively rush, sometimes moving so quietly that only the changing reflections revealed its passage.
Around us, the air carried the deep green scent of laurel, fern and moss, mingled with the earthy richness of decomposition. There were other fragrances too, elusive notes rising from the forest that I could neither identify nor forget.
And then the mist returned.
It drifted between the trees, settling upon leaves and branches, softening the light, touching everything, everywhere. Gradually, it gathered upon our skin and hair until we, too, felt part of this damp, breathing world.
I thought of the mosses and lichens I had been touching, their lives so intimately connected with moisture, and of the ancient trees that had stood here gathering clouds for centuries.
For a fleeting moment, the boundaries seemed to soften.
We were no longer simply visitors looking into the forest, but two more living beings moving through its atmosphere, sharing its water, breathing its fragrant air.
I turned to Neil and kissed his mist-dampened cheek.
As soft and cool as touching moss.
And somewhere above us, unseen amongst the branches, the clouds continued their journey through the trees.
