The Suez Canal....Road between the Seas

May 9, 2015

On November 17, 1869, the Suez Canal connecting the Mediterranean and Red Seas was officially opened in a lavish ceremony at Egypt’s Port Said.

The canal took more than 15 years to plan and build, and its construction was repeatedly hindered by political disputes, labor shortages and even a deadly cholera outbreak.

When finally completed, the 101-mile-long waterway permanently transformed international shipping by allowing vessels to skip the long and treacherous transit around the southern tip of Africa.


The cost for our ship to transit the canal was $300,000.
That's right; $300k..... amazing.














We had a welcoming party as we entered the canal area. A pod of Dolphins rode our bow wake.

We entered at the south end, at the city of Suez. The canal authority has you queue up with other ships over-night. At around 10:00 in the morning, we convoyed northward with 20-30 other ships. The canal is single lane with passing places in the "Ballah By-Pass" and the Great Bitter Lake. It contains no locks; seawater flows freely through it. In general, the canal north of the Bitter Lakes flows north in winter and south in summer. The current south of the lakes changes with the tide at Suez

Every transit vessel has a pilot assigned to guide the ship through the narrow passage.

There are several ways to get across the canal. 




You can take a ferry.

There's a car / truck bridge.

A railroad bridge.

Or you could row your ass off. 

But if you do, you need to look out for big ships.





Playing chicken with ships.













The canal security is everywhere. There are armed guard posts every 3-5 miles of the 101 mile canal.

Canal Enlargement Project.

The Suez Canal is the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia, it is an alternative to rounding Africa at the Cape of Good Hope.

The enlarged canal will allow ships to sail in both directions at the same time over much of the canal's length.

This is expected to decrease waiting hours from 11 to 3 hours for most ships and to double the capacity of the Suez Canal from 49 to 97 ships a day.


Next Stop is Athens for a one-day tour of the new Parthenon Museum and then a flight to Istanbul.