There is no official difficulty grade for this walk
IFCN publishes no difficulty grading for any Madeira trail. We checked three ways: the official register, the trail information panels, and the governing law — which contains no occurrence of the words for “difficulty” or “grade” at all.
So every “Easy / Moderate / Hard” you have read about this trail is somebody’s invention. What does exist is a free-text hazard box on the official panel, and that is what we reproduce below. It matters, because a walk one site grades “moderate” can carry an official vertigo warning.
What the official panel actually warns about
Reported as IFCN publishes it. Note the absences as well as the entries — a warning that appears on other trails and not on this one is telling you something.
Official vertigo warning.
A torch is officially required.
Unlit tunnels along the route.
A mandatory one-way section.
The out-and-back you think you have
Most descriptions still treat PR1 as a there-and-back walk. It is not, beyond a certain point — and that single fact changes what happens if you run out of daylight, water or legs partway across.
How the route actually runs
The walk goes west, through the tunnels. The east route via Pico das Torres is closed.
It is two-way as far as Miradouro da Pedra Rija, and one-way beyond it. Past that point you cannot simply turn around and walk back the way you came.
PR1.3 is partly open: Pico Ruivo to Boca das Torrinhas since June 18, 2026. The continuation to Encumeada remains closed, so it is not an exit.
There are exactly two ways off Pico Ruivo
- PR1.2 to Achada do Teixeira — 2.8 km.
- PR1.1 to Ilha — 8.2 km.
IFCN provides no return transport. Combine that with slot timing and the fact that missed transport is explicitly excluded from refunds, and a hiker whose transfer fails loses the walk and the money.
How busy it is, measured rather than guessed
This is the number 3 trail on the island by recorded demand: 25,309 visitors between July and November 2025, which is 13.6% of every booked trail visit in that period.
Three things that run against the usual advice
- The peak month is September, at 22.9% — later in the year than most guides assume.
- Saturday is the quietest day of the week at 12.7%, and Sunday is the busiest. “Avoid the weekend” is bad advice here.
- The crush is 09:00 to 11:00, easing sharply after 13:00. Under a slot system that is directly actionable: the afternoon slots are the ones still free.
What it costs, and the word that misleads
Booking is compulsory. A slot on this trail costs €10.50.
The ticket is two-tier: €4.50 takes you to the viewpoint only, €10.50 covers the full traverse including PR1.1 and PR1.2.
The 1, 3 and 7-day rates are not passes, and IFCN’s own FAQ is emphatic about it. They grant no free or unlimited access, every trail still needs its own slot booking, and there is no way to buy a multi-day rate directly — you book the trails and the system applies the cheapest pricing at checkout. “Pass” is the searchers’ word, and no other page corrects it.
We do not publish trail status, on purpose
Statuses changed twice in the six weeks before this page was written, and being wrong about a mountain closure is a safety failure rather than an inconvenience. A hand-copied list here would be stale within a week. Check the official sources on the day you walk.