SUEZ CANAL Wed. June 19

            By 7am when I woke up we were already commencing our transit of the Suez Canal. I started with the impression there would be stone/concrete walls on both sides and we would be carefully negotiating between them.

            No such thing. It was a wide waterway (50 metres wide?) with low lying land on both sides. No walls here at all. Just lots of sand in the view outside our cabin balcony door.

            Breakfast upstairs on Level 14 meant we could see the view on the Port side of the ship, and here there were villages with houses and some crops. The desert was held at bay, and there was fresh water irrigation.

            Back on our balcony, where we spent most of the day, we could only see the Starboard side view (northern bank).  Lots of sand, sand hills and occasional military establishments. These consisted of a substantial building with a tower outside, outhouse buildings and views of occasional soldiers with guns slung across their backs. There were also usually a few palm trees round about.

            There was a sandy road of sorts along the side of the canal, with one or two vehicles in the course of a few hours. Soldiers with guns were often spaced 50 metres apart ‘on guard’ facing the canal. These were only near the encampments. What were they guarding against? We couldn’t work it out. Not pirates here, we thought.

            After a couple of hours we passed into the Little Bitter Lakes, then the Large (?) Bitter Lakes. These were natural depressions which filled with sea water from the canal, and we moved towards the Port side to allow passage of ships which had started from the other end. Ships travel from each end in convoy. The captain told us we were the second in our convoy, with a military ship of some sort in front. Don’t know how many in our convoy. While we were idling along at 8 or 9 kms an hour, the convoy from the Mediterranean end came through and passed us. There were six cargo vessels, most with containers.

            At the end of the Bitter Lakes, we headed on. There was more local traffic now. Small fishing boats trailing nets with two or three people. Often one was a boy rowing while the man at the back was throwing out the net.  Then a tarred road appeared from the distance in the desert, and there was a small wharf for the local ferry.  At one of these there were cars and two trucks waiting and loading onto a ferry tied up at the wharf. As we went by we saw the roll on roll off ferry start to pull away and be ready to go across the canal between our ship and the next in the convoy.

Life must go on. 

            A trip upstairs for lunch and we saw the other side of  the canal was much different. Houses and green crops, large military camps with living quarters for rank and file soldiers, and officers’ quarters further along with lots of palms and other trees on higher ground. Better buildings than the concrete ‘bunkers’ for the soldiers.

            There were two significant cultural facilities to see during the afternoon. The first was the War Memorial on our starboard bank. In the centre was a  tall bayonet shaped ornament, and it was surrounded by coloured stone paths and paving, with gardens and palm trees. It was quite magnificent there in the desert, facing the northern bank of the canal. There were lots of rusting metal wrecks poking out of the sand as we went along. I thought these must be relics of the Israeli-Egypt conflicts years ago.

            The other significant feature was the huge bridge across the canal. It stretched four and a half kilometres into the desert before our eyes. There was a similar four and half kilometres approach on the other side as well so that the bridge could be raised high enough in the middle for ships to pass under. We could see traffic – mainly trucks – going over both ways. The Japanese built this bridge some years ago for the Egyptian government. It was most impressive. Which I could show you from my photos if only I knew how to do photos!

            On the bank below the bridge there was a local ferry wharf, with five trucks and some cars lined up waiting. Obviously they were taking advantage of the lower cost of the ferry, so the bridge toll must have been expensive.

            Further along the Canal split into two channels to allow ships from both ends to pass each other. I was surprised to learn that there were many canals in history. Egyptian Pharaohs had the idea to join the two lots of water. These canals were smaller affairs dug through the desert sand and joined the Red Sea and the Nile river. Ships then went down the Nile to join the Mediterranean. These were not long lasting and just eventually silted up.

            By twenty past three we had finished our transit of the Suez Canal and sailed out into the Mediterranean. The Sea Princess has issued me with fancy printed certificate of “Suez Canal Transit” which says I was on board the m/v Sea Princess when she transited the Suez Canal during her World Cruise Voyage, Wednesday, 19^th June 2013. This is signed by the Captain.