AN INCREDIBLE NEW YEAR’S EVE IN FUNCHAL
The city of Funchal is ready to receive eight cruise ships during New Year’s Eve 2023, to welcome the new year 2024. As traditional on the island of Madeira, New Year’s Eve has visits of many cruise ships, which choose to dock and anchor in the bay of Funchal, to watch this fantastic fireworks show.
Overlooking the entire amphitheater of the bay, this very old tradition attracts thousands of tourists and passengers on this special day. This year, for the second year in a row, the island of Madeira received the award for Best European Cruise Destination at the World Cruise Awards. This year, the port of Funchal once again hosted lots of beautiful vessels to celebrate the new year in this wonderful Atlantic Island.
Madeira received the following cruise ships: Borealis -Fred Olsen Cruise Lines,
Marella Explorer-Marella Cruises,
Spirit of Adventure - Saga Cruises,
Arcadia -P&O Cruises,
Mein Schiff 1 and Mein Schiff 3 for Tui Cruises, Queen Victoria -Cunard Line,
AidaCosma - Aida Cruises.
They confirmed their presence to watch the famous fireworks event in the bay of Funchal, which has lighted up New Year’s Eve. The first to arrive has been Mein Schiff 1at around 05:30, followed by Arcadia at 06:45, Queen Victoria at 07:00, Borealis at 07:00, Spirit Of Adventure at 10:00, Marella Explorer at 16:00, AidaCosma at 21:30 and Mein Schiff 3 at 22:00. There have been almost 27 thousand people watching the New Year’s Eve fireworks display in Funchal on board cruise ships.
The pyrotechnic show has been preceded by 20 minutes of animation and countdown, using the projection of ‘laser’ rays and other effects, creating a ballet of lights. The New Year’s Eve fireworks took place across a seven-kilometre front, at the pyrotechnic launch points, which has been illuminating the bay of Funchal, in one of the region’s most important postcards for the tourist market.
An extraordinary event that repeats every year, which we are pleased to witness on Cruising Journal through this small selection of images. An experience to fully live on board one of the ships that visit Funchal in the last days of each year, a presence now consolidated but always exciting.