Before our trip, I had one simple photographic wish: to come home with at least a handful of decent fog shots from the laurel forest at Fanal. I wasn’t sure if it would be realistic – I didn’t know the conditions up there, and with a little one in tow it was hard to predict whether it might be too stormy, too chilly, or simply impractical.
But as it turned out, September was kind to us. Not only did it work out, we ended up returning again and again. We were staying nearby, so it was often on our way anyway, and when Porto Moniz felt a little too warm, the cool 17°C at 1,100 metres was a very welcome escape.
The Laurissilva is a relic of Europe’s original subtropical rainforests. Some of the trees here are said to be up to 600 years old, and since 1999 the forest has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It’s also home to unique bird species found nowhere else, and the trees themselves are extraordinary: mosses, lichens, and even ferns grow right out of the branches. Some trunks measure six to eight metres around – something I hadn’t realised before wandering into its more hidden corners.
From a photographic perspective, this forest is world-famous, long a favourite of nature and landscape photographers. But oddly enough, you don’t see many of them there. As I mentioned in my first Madeira post, sunrise tends to draw a different crowd – most notably young women in flowing white dresses, capturing “that” shot. No judgement intended, just an honest observation of what you’ll see most often.
So instead of chasing the textbook compositions and waiting endlessly for a clear frame, we simply wandered to whichever spot was empty and explored the angles there. And because we went back so many times, I still managed to capture every tree I had hoped to, without stress. With Ben along, each visit lasted no more than two and a half hours, so later in the trip we stuck mainly to the quieter edge times – mornings had maybe a quarter of the people compared to mid-day.
I’ll admit: after seeing so many stunning images of this forest, my first impression was almost deflating. We loved the place immediately – the atmosphere, the fog – but I struggled to translate that into photos that really worked. From the second visit onwards, though, I began to find one or two images per outing that I felt good about.
Most of the shots in this series were taken during blue hour. I love that mystical mood, and I always lean into it by using a cooler, slightly bluish white balance in-camera. Not everyone’s cup of tea, but it’s very much mine 😉
More details can be found under the photos themselves – for now, I hope you enjoy this series. 👋
I hope you enjoyed the series 😊👋