Finally a ferry between Venice and Egypt?....
 

Just been trawling through some European sites on the Sahara, and uncovered this:

inforMARE - Notizie

Looks like there are plans for a new ferry: Venice-Egypt-Syria-Venice

Venice to Egypt in 60hrs
Venice to Syria in 68hrs

200 trucks, 80 cars and 400 passengers

Lets hope this one actually goes ahead!!

Good find!

Lets keep our fingers crossed, but knowing the egyptian beauracracy, I'll only believe it when I see it!!!!

Andy

Hello Andy!
The line will be run by an Italian Company, not Egyptian, and for one departure each week.
They also say that if the outcome will be good, they'll increase the number of departures from one to two each week.

It sounds pretty good, if it appears to be real
We just have to wait until May 20th.... I remember the 80' and 90 when Espresso Egitto operate between Bari and Alex. I have took this ferry 2 times and the BIG advantage was that the Italian Company managed a lot of the mandatory paperwork to enter in Egypt with a car. Hope it will be the same thing?
RR.

A member of an Italian overland motorcycling message board has given a ring to Visemar Line, which is organizing everything.

They told him the line will be "circular": departure from Venice, Italy on Thursday with arrival at port in Tartous (Syria) on Sunday.
Departure from Tartous the same day and arrival at port in Alexandria, Egypt on Monday morning.
Departure from Alexandria at evening/night of Monday and arrival on Thursday morning at Venice port.
Carriage fee for 4 persons astride 2 motorcycles (this friend's particular case) is about 1000 euro.

Hope this helps.

Hello trans-african, seems you found my post on Sahara.it :thumbup1:

The service to Egypt is very interesting, here are timetables and the foreseen costs, a new website for the online reservation system will be shortly available at: Visemar Line - Ferry Services - Italy Syria Egypt
From what I know motorcycle costs will be between 150 and 200 Euro.

http://www.deserts.it/temp/oraritraghetto.jpg
http://www.deserts.it/temp/prezzi1.jpg
http://www.deserts.it/temp/prezzi2.jpg

ciao
luciano

Well done, Luciano!

Greetz from Mantova.

Looks very interesting........... certainly another option

mmmmm...........

Ive been thinking about this, and having experienced both the land border crossing at sollum from Libya which was quite easy, and Alex port when shipping in a container from UK, the shipping option was to put it mildly, stressfull............it took 3 days to get the cars cleared but this was not helped in any way at all by the fact that our UK shipping company sent them to the wrong port, but thats another story!

So I have a couple of queries
Are the prices quoted 'driven cars & passenger' for the car, driver & passenger or for the car alone with the driver & passenger in addition.

once arrival at Alexandria, what are the formalities / costs / procedures likely to be, similar to the land border at sollum??

and how long are the formalities likely to take.

Any info / advice would be appreciated.

It certainly appeals to me as coming from UK I calculate about 6 days till arrival in Alex, and really pushing it, its seven days driving coming overland from UK, plus the various costs etc with ferry to Tunis, Libyan guides, border fees etc etc.
Last year I had 2 uses of my (expensive) carnet into Egypt, this would make it much more affordable!
Andy

certainly an option
 

around Lybia and Tunisia. I'll be crossing from Jordan to Egypt, and this looks like a good work around the lybian visas and guide only to catch the ferry from Tunis.

Going to Italy this weekend, I'll try to get my Italian mates to ring up and find out the proces for bikes Alex-Venice and report back.

Thanks in advance for your feedback, Camel

RR.

Thanks
 

I'd like to add my thanks to all involved in researching this.

It is quite exciting.

Not quite holding my breath though. The last ferry I took, Italy to Middle East, was refused entry to Beirut harbour, we were dumped in Syria (without visas), the passengers revolted and much much later we were allowed to the Lebanon. Needless to say, this was the last run for this company, as the boss had disappeared with all the cash.

Of course that kind of thing could never happen here in Egypt.

Looking forward to hearing the stories of the first guinnea pigs.

This is great news, 2 years ago I spent the day in Lattakia looking for a so called ferry to Cyprus... needless to say I was a few year late :oops2:


Great .... news .... I can almost hear my brain working....

I really hope this is a reality..

Skipping Libya would save us a lot of time and agro and most importantly, MONEY !!!

Any more Info??
 

A week away from the first sailing...

Does anyone have more info?

Does the vehicle price include passengers?

Does the passengers price include cabins?

Where are those guinnea pigs?