Puerto de la Cruz Carnival 2027 fills the old town of this northern Tenerife resort with one of the friendliest, most gay-embraced carnivals in the Canary Islands, built around the cult Mascarita Ponte Tacon high-heel race. Themed “Under the Sea” (Bajo el Mar), the festival is expected to run from late January into February 2027, turning the streets around the Plaza del Charco into a sea of sequins, mermaids and drag. Puerto de la Cruz Carnival 2027 is smaller and more intimate than the island’s giant Santa Cruz carnival, and all the more charming for it.
The signature night is the Mascarita Ponte Tacon, a riotous men’s race in high heels that has defined the town’s carnival since 1990. Competitors in wigs, false lashes and glitter must wear heels of a regulated minimum height, which stewards actually measure, before sprinting through the historic centre. Run in categories for speed, duos and groups, it draws big late-night crowds and has become the image that identifies the town far beyond Tenerife.
The race traditionally sets off around 10pm from the Ermita de San Telmo by the sea, with heel-height checks at the Plaza de los Reyes Catolicos, and finishes amid roaring crowds at the Plaza del Charco. It is free to watch, gloriously silly and completely central to the town’s identity as a welcoming, camp-friendly resort.
The 2027 edition takes “Under the Sea” as its theme, with mermaids, corals and sea creatures shaping the costumes and floats. Around the Mascarita, the programme follows the classic Canarian carnival shape: the election of the carnival queen, the children’s gala, the grand Coso parade along the seafront and the Entierro de la Sardina that buries the party at the end. Each year the carnival also honours a guest country, and the whole thing spills through the compact old town rather than a single arena.
Puerto de la Cruz has long been one of the most relaxed, LGBTQ+-comfortable towns in Tenerife, and the carnival plays to that. The action is walkable, the bars stay busy and the mood is warm and unbothered, which makes it an easy first Canarian carnival for visitors who find the big-city editions overwhelming.
Puerto de la Cruz is unusual in holding two carnivals a year. Alongside the traditional winter festival it stages the Carnaval de Verano, the Summer Carnival of the Canary Islands, in the warmer months, which has helped make this small resort one of the archipelago’s carnival capitals. That double bill keeps its drag and street culture visible far beyond February and gives the town a year-round camp confidence. For 2027, though, the headline remains the winter edition and its Under the Sea theme, with the Mascarita as its unmissable centrepiece.
Dates for 2027 are still provisional and taken from local press: Puerto de la Cruz Carnival 2027 is expected to run from around 20 January to 14 February 2027, with the Mascarita Ponte Tacon pencilled in for Friday 12 February and the Gran Coso parade for Saturday 13 February. Confirm the final calendar on the town council’s site once the official programme is published in the autumn. The festivities centre on the Plaza del Charco, 38400 Puerto de la Cruz, and most street events are free.
Tenerife’s wider gay calendar sits alongside Gran Canaria’s; our guide to CanCanaria Adventure Week 2026 is a useful way to plan a longer Canary Islands trip around the carnival.
A cult high-heel race, an Under the Sea theme and a walkable old-town party in the winter sun make Puerto de la Cruz Carnival 2027 a delight. It is intimate, camp and genuinely local, a carnival where you feel part of the town rather than a spectator. For anyone who wants Canarian carnival without the crush, this northern Tenerife classic is the one to pick.
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