Saudi Arabia to the UK - My Plan
 

Good afternoon guys.

I'm planning a rather special road trip later on this year to deliver my Ducati Scrambler from my workplace in Saudi Arabia back to my home in the UK - see my introduction thread here http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...planning-90413 . At the moment I'm fairly happy with the theoretical route I want to take but I'm pretty stuck on a single element that I'm hoping I might be able to get help with.

My journey will start in Ta'if, Saudi Arabia and my plan is to head up the coast to Duba, from there I believe I can get a ferry across to Sharm El'Sheik in Egypt. From SES I am plan to head up to the Northern coast of Egypt to Port Said and here is where my issues lie.

I'm led to believe that there is a ferry from Port Said that goes to Athens, possibly via Rhodes. I have searched many websites (mostly broker-type travel websites and all a few years out of date) and cannot find any definitive information as to whether this route exists or could be travelled by myself and my bike. In a similar vein I'm also told (but have nothing to back it up) that there is a cargo ferry that runs between Port Said and Turkey (or Turkish Cyprus), but I'm not well versed as to whether this type of option would be open to me - I'd rather not leave it to chance that I could simply pitch up and ask politely if I could join them on their crossing, put it that way.

I believe there are alternative options from Israel and Lebanon into Turkey, but these will cause me huge visa issues returning back into Saudi Arabia once my trip is done and I have to return to work. The same goes for travelling in the opposite direction via Iran.

Any help, advice or experience would be most appreciated.

Dave, I've never been to Israel (therefore I cannot answer definitively from personal experience), but I have read that the Israeli Immigration Authorities - who are very well aware of the problems - can be very obliging by not stamping directly into your passport when entering and exiting their country. Instead they are supposedly quite willing to stamp a separate piece of paper, thus leaving no evidence of the visit in your passport pages.

In such circumstances neither the KSA nor Iran could discover the fact that you had spent time in Israel. :innocent:

That would definitely be a bonus - though I'd still need to find a relatively safe way into Israel (that whole peninsula North of Sharm El'Sheikh is an FCO no-go area although Jordan could be an option?) and I'd prefer to go from Northern Egypt to Greece/Cyprus if I can. The issue isn't so much with visiting Israel or Iran as a British passport holder - it's that I'd have to go back to Saudi after the trip and they found out they wouldn't let me back in - so I'd effectively lose my job.

There is a ferry from Duba port (KSA) to Iskenderun (Turkey). Which I believe is a better option.

Ferry name is Hatay RORO. Just google it and you will be directed to their website and from their you can contact their agent in KSA.

Good luck.

Ossaimi