Westysclan World Cruise 2023

Suez Canal

Our journey into the Suez Canal began in the dark at 4:30am. We didn’t set an alarm thinking the engines starting and anchor being lifted would wake us. Wrong! Our body clocks had us awake at our usual 6am.

We were ship number 3 in a convoy of 38. We travelled through the Canal at 8.5 knots, with all ships maintaining a 2.5 nautical mile space between each other.

No. 2 in front of us

No. 4 behind us

Nos. 5 & 6 just visible in the background

Hutch, our destination expert, provided commentary from the bridge throughout the day to the outside decks 7, 14 & 15. You could also turn your stateroom TV to the bridge cam and get the commentary while you watched from your balcony. We started by doing this as we are on the Port side of the ship and could see the sites on the more developed continent of Africa side of the Canal. However it felt like seeing only 1/2 of the story, so by 7am we were up on the top deck to get a 360° view of everything.

Africa side

Asia side

I spent from 7am to 10am (with a quick break for breakfast) doing laps of deck 15. I clocked up almost 20000 steps but it felt effortless as the scenery was continually changing and I took regular stops for photos.

Dredgers are constantly at work in the canal

These floating bridge sections are down the sides of much of the Canal. We were told they could be assembled into a bridge in as quickly as 20 minutes

1/2 way through

Yes, they can row quickly when they have a cruise ship headed towards them blasting it’s horn

These empty ships are waiting in the lake to hear directions for collecting their next cargo.

We reached the end of the Great Bitter Lake at about 10am and entered the new section of the Canal.

No. 2 leading the way

Old Canal on the left, new Canal on the right.

Pilot boat going in the opposite direction down old canal

One of the many murals

In addition to the one permanent bridge across the canal, their are numerous other ways to cross over. This includes moving bridges and car ferries. The ferries dart across in between the ships in the convoy. There is also currently one tunnel under the canal with 4 more under construction- 2 road and 2 rail.