Every year, believers congregate on the golden beaches of Brazil to worship the Goddess of the Sea, Iemanjá. Throngs of Candomblé followers enact some unorthodox rites of worship alongside hundreds of thousands of New Year revellers.

Iemanjá is also the Goddess of Carnal Pleasures and it is up to her followers to sate her appetite once a year with a menu of overt dancing, smoking and trances. As part of the beach rituals cigar-toting priests and priestesses usher people forward to enter trances - pegar um passo.

The highlights take place at dusk as celebrants administer offerings to the goddess. Rafts are covered with everything from champagne to perfume and flowers and launched out to sea.

New Year's Eve becomes a celebration of cultural and religious diversity as all Brazilians come together to see in the New year, whether they are believers of Iemanja or not.

Source: What’s on When

Suggestion of ARTEH® Hotels in Brazil.

- Toca da Coruja in Pipa
- Pousada Convento do Carmo in Salvador da Bahia
- Pestana Angra in Angra dos Reis
- Brava Hotel in Buzios