New Maritime Bus Initiative

In Search of Hope – by Sam Gannon

Seconded to the parish of Tililngdon, the Reverend Dolores has been presented with a challenge.

She’s living in an antiquated house and she’s cold. Furthermore, her new Bishop, Bishop Alice does not approve of ‘showgirls in dog collars.’

Determined to prove the Bishop wrong, she sets about warming her house – who cares if it smells of horse! There is the crochet club, jumble sale, and soup run to organise. And this year, the church bells will ring, no matter what threats are made. Even more so, the newly formed choir will spread a little joy this Christmas, even though they can’t sing – yet! And with a little help from Phil, her bassist, this year could be full of magic.

However, she has a fight on her hands as the townies out in Knob Hill – she must stop calling it that, are trying to stop her from ringing her bells. When Krystal with a K decides to do some volunteer work, Dolores sets out to see just how committed she really is.

Up to her ears in granny squares and squawking choristers, Dolores is revving up for Christmas, yet a deeper darker secret is beginning to emerge!

A secret that could blow the whole parish apart and put Dolores in danger.

(available from Amazon)

Joy4rent Lda has introduced its new vessel ‘SeaYou’. The company intends to create a ‘maritime bus’ service between Calheta (Porto de Recreio) and Caniçal (Quinta do Lorde), with a stopover in Funchal (Pier 8). If all goes well the company is hoping to run a service to Porto Santo in the summer and may extend to the north of the island.

The new service was outlined by Company Director, Afonso Gomes, during a visit from the President of Madeira at the Recreational Port of Calheta. The service which will complement other tourism ventures forsees the creation of 10 -15 jobs.

Afonso Gomes, who is also one of the mentors of this business model, speaks of “an innovative project that comes, in essence, to solve one of the great problems that we have here on the island, which is travelling the island by land. This new service will allow more tourists to enjoy the island by sea, thus easing both pedestrian and vehicular congestion.

For now, the ‘maritime bus,’ is, more geared towards tourism, although the company is keen for residents to take advantage of the service.

Up until the end of March, the company is offering round trips at €27.50 per person. After this, the cost of travelling on the SeaBus will increase by 50%.

On Tuesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays, the SeaBus will depart from Calheta, and on the remaining days of the week, excluding Monday, depart from Caniçal. The maritime bus departs at 08:30 and the pick-up of passengers in Funchal will take place around 9:45 am and 10 am, depending on the direction of travel”, he clarifies.

The modern catamaran, in addition to a comfortable trip, offers free Wi-Fi, a bar (drinks and snacks), and is ecologically friendly as all the electrical systems of the vessel are powered by solar panels. The vessel’s propulsion was to be electrified, but an unforeseen event changed the plans and compromised the application for community support.

“The initial investment was around 600 thousand euros. However, the original spec was to be propelled by electric engines, but due to a failure of our suppliers, we lost the support from ADRAMA, and the project has been self-funded,” confessed Afonso Gomes.

Providing all goes well, we are looking towards providing a summer service to Porto Santo and later on the north of the island.

Samantha Gannon

info at madeira-weekly.com

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