Cruisers know only too well that life can throw a curved ball. A pandemic, a storm or a war can change best laid plans. Those who WORLD CRUISE, and some do each year to avoid the cold and costs of heating, know that a route can change. The uprisings of 2024 have caused problems in the SUEZ CANAL that cruise ships will not risk. What this means is that many ships that set out in January, with a world cruise routed and planned back around India, into the Arab ports of the Middle East amnd through the Suez Canal have been rerouted.

Whilst almost everyone at sea has been talking about this, the changes have to be held back until those whose job it is to PUSH TIN – that is dock, park and sail ships – have to change the routes, the supplies, the ports they dock at. With a smaller number of ports along the African Coast, gaining permission to dock or anchor is a huge scheduling task. Then, all the tours booked in the Middle East are cancelled and tours have to be arranged in Africa.

In practice, to the traveller, it is changing one gift for another. What is has meant for Jean and I is to look at Africa and build a menu of cruise ports that we had ignored. We have been to the Indian Ocean and to Africa, but never cruised Africa. The safari element is huge, but Africa has so much more. Wonderful people, the clearest skies and a welcome you will never forget.

For those interested in PUSHING TIN – planes have the same problem, and there are two things we can mention that are of interest. First is the film Pushing Tin where a feud develops between two air traffic controllers: one cocky and determined  (John Cusack) while the other is restrained and laidback (Billy Bob Thornton). Second, is the musical, COME FROM AWAY, which chronicles the real-life experiences of the people of Gander, Newfoundland, and the almost 7000 airline passengers who were forced to land there when US air space was closed on September 11, 2001. Whilst both are about air traffic, they show the problems of parking tin. There are also the versions of books that can be read.

The movie Blood Diamonds shows a darker side of that coast, so rich in minerals it has been plundered for centuries. So, the coast is not without history and tragedy. Di Caprio is great in the movie version of Blood Diamonds. Our own cruise crime novelist, Stuart St Paul added his own cruise crime diamond smuggling story to the list so if you want to stay more ship based, then you can read his Cruise Ship Blood Diamonds. Which ever way, they all show how people and countries are affected when TIN gets pushed somewhere else.

Our Doris Visits menu for Africa has begun. This is the mid section, the main land mass of Africa which ships will power around. The tip of the southern part is near the Antartica and has penguins. The bird life is as abundant as are the wild animals in Game Reserves and the wild, both land and in the wetlands. Take a look at Africa.

We will then improve our Indian Ocean and India menu for the east side of Africa, and then come back and revamp our west coast menu that runs down from Gibraltar, past Morocco to the Canary Islands and Cape Verde.

Plus, we are going to sail the route ourselves, so by the summer we will add films that will include a number of ports.  Click the map to go to our growing African Cruise menu.

AFRICA circumnavigation of the mainland of Africa Somalia to Cape Verde