Suez Canal

Three days ago we sailed through the Suez Canal. We were meant to start the journey at 4.00am but another ship had broken down along the canal so that ship had to be removed before we could commence our journey, eventually around 8.00am.
What can I tell you about the canal.  It is much narrower than I expected and ships have to follow through in convoy style one behind the other with 6-8 to a convoy.  The canal is approximately 193km long, 24 metres deep and 205 metres wide.  At around about the mid point the canal flows into Bitter Lake and at some points the canal splits into two.
The canal was started in 1861 with the use of slaves with shovels and picks and there are memorials along the canal in remembrance of these workers.  Can you imagine how hard that would have been.  Anyone that has ever tried to build a sand-castle when the sand is not wet enough knows how difficult sand is to work with! Napoleon Bonaparte was the first to consider building it in 1798 but his surveyors must have had too much wine on that trip because they informed him that the Red Sea was 30 foot higher than the Mediterranean! In fact there is very little height difference between the seas so there is no need for locks as there are in the Panama Canal.
The building of the canal stalled in 1863 when the Egyptian leader at the time banned the use of slave labour.  It wasn’t until the Suez Canal Company was formed and steam and coal powered heavy machinery was brought in that it was finally opened in 1869.
There is only one bridge across the Suez Canal and it was built as a collaboration between the Egyptian and Japanese Governments.  It has several names but I like “Mubarack Peace Bridge” the best. This bridge is almost 3kms long with a 70 metre clearance under the bridge. It links the continents of Asia and Africa.