Travel: Tunisia is back on the tourist map and well worth a visit during 2018

Tunisian tourist chiefs breathed a collective sigh of relief when one of Britain's favourite holiday resorts was taken off the 'Don't Go' list late last year.

It’s was also good news for those Brits who love this part of the world and its 11 million people.

More than 400,000 used to visit each year and many were regular customers.

That all came to a bloody end in June 2015, when a university student opened fire on sunbathers near the popular destination of Sousse before being shot dead by security forces.

Port El Kantaoui Marina six miles north of Sousse.

By then he had killed 38 people – 30 of them British tourists. Responsibility was claimed by “Islamic State.”

The bloodshed and the subsequent advice against travel by the British Government had a devastating effect upon Tunisia, which derives 15 per cent of its national income from tourism.

But now tour operators have resumed normal service after the Tunisian Government beefed up security and the British Foreign Office relaxed its warning.

Many visitors come for the sun, sea and sand to this country, sandwiched between Algeria to the west and Libya to the east. It has a 900-mile long coastline on the North African shore of the Mediterranean.

Its southern shoreline boasts 550 miles of sand. At Djerba Island, where I was based, it is as white and soft as sugar.

Hotel manager Mohamed Jerad told me: “Our hearts go out to the families of those who died. But these terrib