Leisure travel in a post-Covid 19 world

"We've gone for our last overseas holiday. At least for a long while," I told my wife.

This was in Feb? Mar? of this year (2020).

When did flights get grounded? (Spoiler alert: in mid March, countries all started to restrict entry of non-residents by turn.)

By 23 March 2020 SIA had cut 96% of their flights.

Other airlines also did the same about the same time.

Next year, my child will be in school, and will need to follow the school terms. So we can only go on holidays during term/semester break and we would be travelling with other families with school-going kids.

We had planned one last hurrah this year. It is not to be.

Dolphins at Monkey Mia

My daughter is currently fascinated by Dolphins.
I had an extended conversation with her where she asked if it were possible to keep a dolphin as a pet.
I told her that (bottlenose) dolphins live to 50 or 60 years in the wild.
But those in captivity seldom live longer than 20 years. And in at least one dolphin exhibit, two dolphins died at about 10 years old.
Then we told her that we had been to Monkey Mia, where a pod of residential dolphins come to the beach every morning for breakfast with humans.
So now I'll plan our holiday in Perth, Western Australia.
The plan is fly to Perth, rent a car, and drive up to Monkey Mia.

That plan is now on hold.

Airlines have started to implement changes in response to the pandemic.




But

"there are only two things that [would] make people come back... One is a vaccine, so people feel safe going to the airport or sitting with 150 strangers in a plane. The other is people having the wherewithal to travel. Do you have a job? Do you have enough money that you can think of taking your family on a vacation? These are things that control the airlines’ future, and that they cannot do anything about.”

So until there is a vaccine (which is at least a year away) we cannot safely travel. Without a lot of luck.

And when planes fly again, it is not likely that there will be a lot of flights that fares will be as low as it used to be.

And if fares are not low, then the question is do we have the wherewithal to travel. We may be limited to destinations nearer and cheaper.


Covid-19 Is Changing The Way We Travel — These Are Safe Distancing Measures That Airlines Are Taking