Miradouro da Santinha

The Porto Moniz swimming pools are directly below. From up here the lava basins read as one pattern in the black rock, with the Atlantic pushing white water in at the edges and the cliffs of the north coast closing the frame. It is a bird's-eye view of a place most people only ever see from inside the water.

The other half of it is the quiet. One visitor who knows Madeira's other viewpoints called this one less crowded, and it works as a short stop rather than an outing — you park, you look, you take the photograph everyone takes of the pools.

• Water and toilets are down in Porto Moniz — the nearest drinking fountain about 300 m away, the public toilets about 600 m away and free.
• Quieter than Madeira's better-known viewpoints, by the account of a visitor who has seen the others.
• A tourist information office sits down in Porto Moniz, about 600 m from the viewpoint.
• Two more stops are close by — the Fort of São João Baptista in the town, and Seixal with its black-sand beach a short drive along the coast.

Everything starts in Porto Moniz. Local roads climb out of the town and up the hillside — a few minutes by car, by one visitor's account — and they finish at the viewpoint itself, so you step out and the pools are already below you. No walk in.

On foot it works too: an uphill route up from the town centre. Coming along the coast, the viewpoint sits above the pools, so aim for the town first and take the road up from there.

Best: sunrise and sunset.

Avoid: rain.

Low sun is what the pools want — at either end of the day it rakes across the black rock and the water, and that is the picture people drive up for. Rain takes the view away and makes the footpath down a poor idea, so on a wet day there is little reason to linger.