28.08.2026 – Nature is no museum

Many exhibitions have a name or a theme; they showcase paintings by specific artists or from particular periods. We pay an entrance fee and can view a painting by Picasso, Klimt, or Chagall. The museum guarantees that these artists are represented. 

In nature, it’s different. How can we guarantee something we can’t control? Our Picasso might be a pilot whale, Klimt a bottlenose dolphin, and Chagall a tropical whale. We can observe all these marine mammals off the coast of Madeira at this time of year; some are passing by, and some are resident. But they aren’t hanging on a wall, nor are they located in a specific spot in the ocean. We have to search for them anew for each tour, locate them, and then reach them. Today we saw Pilot whales (Globicephala macrorhynchus) and Bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus), but unfortunately, we had no sightings on our late Ribeira Brava tour.

by Claudia Gomes