MARCO POLO a long time visitor in Madeira

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The 1965 cruise ship MARCO POLO making her way in Funchal's waters after a transatlantic crossing from Bridgetown, on 5th January 2011.
MARCO POLO is the former ALEKSANDR PUSHKIN built in Mathias Thesen Werft, East Germany for the late soviet owned Black Sea Shipping Co. and nowadays the sole survivor of the 5 ship class Ivan Franko.
Early in her career she served as an ocean liner, crossing the Atlantic regularly between Leningrad and Montreal, until the late 70's as she begun her cruise operations.She did visit Funchal quite often as ALEKSANDR PUSHKIN, chartered to western european companies. In 1993 and after a period laid up she was purchased by Orient Lines of NCL renamed MARCO POLO in tribute to the famous venetian explorer. Eventually refited to return to service, she was a great sucess in classic cruising for many years to follow. In 2008 Orient Lines seases operations and the ship is sold to Global Maritime that immediatly charters her to Transocean Tours of Rostock. In 2010 MARCO POLO is again chartered, however for a newly founded company, Cruise & Martime Voyages and operates mainly for the british market.It's always a delight to see this handsome ship visiting Funchal by the times, the last of it's kind and judging from her actual shape and condition i'm sure she'll be sailing the seas for many more years.

Comments

  1. VMFSeptember 15, 2011 at 5:47 AM

    I haven´t seen this ship for years, she looks amazing, thanks for sharing, beautiful

    Best
    Vitor

    ReplyDelete
  2. João AbreuSeptember 16, 2011 at 3:10 AM

    I knew you would especially like this one ;) It's such a delight to see a ship of this age and beauty still sailling the seven seas.

    Regards

    ReplyDelete

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