Hi all,

Sorry for the radio silence on this. We finally got our car in Alexandria, and then had to race down to Aswan to make our ferry to Sudan. In the end, the car came in fine - not a scratch - but we did have a couple of things stolen from the cabin (our fault for not being able to fit everything in the back to lock it up) and it did take a lot of time and money to get the car through customs.

Here's the lowdown:

Total delay (accounting for reloading from the original Grimaldi ship, whose stop at Alex was cancelled, plus delay of the replacement ship) = 6 days.

Total time and cost taken to get through customs, etc = 4 days, around 500 euros:
Day 1: delivery order (E£467) and letter from the Egyptian Automobile club E£300
Day 2: access passes for the port (free)
Day 3: ship arrives and unloads, wait and do nothing
Day 4: customs and traffic police. All in all took 5 hours, which apparently is "quick" (some other overlander friends of ours took the whole day). We paid (all E£): 535 for the carnet stamp/customs, 160 for mandatory insurance, 240 for storage of the car (in our case only a day so this quickly adds up), 100 for Egyptian license plates. We paid our fixer EUR 300 for his services. If you are unlucky you have to buy a fire extinguisher too (even if you already carry several...).

Every step is accompanied by lots and lots of waiting, handshaking, handing out tips, endless inspections of the car and its contents... and an incredible amount of photo copies of passports, carnets, etc.

All in all, we are now just relieved to have the car in one piece. It took a while to get there but the process is not that complicated if you are patient, are willing to pay and can lock away all that is in the car. If you're on a tight budget and tight for time, this may not be the best option for you.

Hope this helps!

Good luck, and let me know if you need more specific info.

Emma

I spoke with Visemar about a month ago - they are supposedly restarting the RoPax service in October - that's fine for us - we haven't booked yet as dates are still a bit fluid - has anyone successfully booked this recently?

Ian

Emma, thank you.

This is a fantastically detailed post, and so "polite" . This information is most needed to the community of overlanders, a certainly food for thought for those interested, who knows, maybe some of us would know personally high level Egyptian authorities and would be willing to engage into policy level discussion with them to put an end to this non-sense. Have a good trip, Be safe.

If thats true my problems are sorted but i doubt it is. Can anyone confirm this for sure???

So i decided to be proactive.....NOTE the "probably" statement.

Dear Mr Neill,

Cargo and Passengers Service will be probably resumed in October.
All information regarding departures from October will be available at the end of July.



Best regards


Jihane El Yakout

Passenger Customer Service
Punto Franco, Santa Marta, Mag. 16 - 30123 Venezia
VAT n.: IT03961450271
Tel.: +39.041.2712509
Mob.: +39.3457221320
Fax: +39.041.2712507
e-mail: pax@visemarline.com

That's progress! Under the previous regime you had to buy two (apparently the factory making extinguishers belonged to the then minister of transport). His successor is learning pretty fast!

__________________
----------------
Roman (UK)

I've just tried to book a crossing (truck + 2 pax) for end October with Visemar Venice - Alex using their online booking facility - it was bounced at the end of the process - so I'm currently enquiring "manually" - I'll update this as and when any information arrives.

Ian

This is the reply from Visemar today:


Good morning Ian,

the service is actually suspended up until october, when we will most certainly restart it. Fact is that we're still studying different plans and routes in order to revamp our line service after the break, and due to this we can't ensure you departure dates, nor actual confirmed rates. We kindly ask you to contact us somewhere near September, in order to have a clearer vision and, hopefully, fixed days and rates of travelling.

Sorry for the inconvenience
Kind regards


If I may suggest that if anyone is interested in using this service, then now is the time to show Visemar that there are customers out there - if enough people enquire then maybe they'll restart it. Their website is: www.visemarline.com/ and the email address is info@visemarline.com

A little birdy at the RAC just told me they spoke to someone at the ferry company and its starting October (for sure) missing out Syria. Now we all know who this person is so we've got to presume they wouldn't tell him bull.

Hi all, thanks for the info and please keep it coming - we are heading North towards Europe and trying to determine the best route.

Hi All,
I phoned Visemar yesterday to ask when the Venice to Alex ferry will re-start. I was told categorically that it will not be running in the foreseeable future due to the "continued trouble in Syria and Egypt". When I mentioned to the chap in the Italian office that their web site says the service will be resumed in October he gave a sigh. I too was hoping to be on this ferry in October.

Back to the plan of shipping my car then flying out to Egypt to meet it...

Jim.

Hi All, This all makes interesting reading and thanks to all for useful information. I plan to ship two WW2 Jeeps to Egypt next March. Obviously too far away to make serious enquiries yet, but, following Roamingyak's advice, I have made a tentative enquiry. T

__________________
Toby

I don't believe it! They've said more than once that it will absolutely start again in October and now one person says "no it won't". Theres no trouble in Egypt any more and the new route will bypass Syria according to everything i've heard off the ferry company. Do you think i need to Email again and get the Paul G on the case again?

If this is true that its not going to run, i'm going to drive through Syria and if i can do that then the damn ferry is hardly going to have a problem. Two years to plan and a few months to screw it all up.

Ok then. Its confirmed. Its not going to run. bugger.
I sent them a specific question and got a specific answer.





Dear Neill,

Service has been suspended last mid of June.

Actually we have to say that the service will be not resumed.
Too many complication in Syria and in Egypt too.


Regards

Emanuele Volo
Operation

Punto Franco - Santa Marta - Fabb. 16 - 30123 VENEZIA
VAT n.: IT03961450271
Tel.: +39 041.2712662
Fax: +39 041.2712507
Mob: +39 345 7274188

This is really bad news... We're planning a trip form Belgium to Cape Town, starting in january 2012 and we really counted on this ferry... We could try to go via turkey, syria and jordan, but it is a really big detour, especially since we leave in the middle of the winter and it will be cold. Sleeping in a rooftop tent is not ideal under these conditions. And then there are the troubles in Syria.

I think we only have two options left (i) shipping the car to south africa and start over there, we'll see where we get (ii) shipping the car to egypt, but that seems so much hassle...

Does anyone have a similar problem or a suggestion?