You know what they say about opinions – well, here is mine.
When the world first shut down I was a huge supporter of all that was enacted. I understood staying home meant my clients’ and my own personal travel plans would be seriously disrupted and my business severely jeopardized. I also knew right from the start that two weeks would never only be two weeks and we would all need to hunker down for a while. I did so diligently, and even gladly, though it meant not seeing my own children or a single friend in months. I didn’t even get takeout until my local pizza joint introduced “contactless delivery” as I didn’t want to put someone else in harm’s way. My social life consisted of Zoom meetings and nodding to strangers on my local trail, while using my large dogs to make sure we were plenty more than six feet apart.
It wasn’t until my son got his dream job in Florida and had to report at short notice that I put gas in the car for the first time in longer than I could recall. We live in Ohio and at the time our state was blazing trails on keeping numbers down and frankly I was quite nervous at the prospect of a road trip. This is a stark contrast from the person who loves to be on the road and will jump on a plane at a moment’s notice with little info and figure out my sleeping situation and itinerary along the way. I insisted we pull our camper along with his belongings to be able to avoid hotels, restaurants, and people. As it turned out, I witnessed far more responsibility and seriousness being taken in Florida than risks. By the time I returned, while still not planning to venture out again until deemed appropriate for the purpose of doing my part, traveling, at least by road, and visiting the state of Florida wasn’t as scary as I had anticipated.
Shortly thereafter, we had a family emergency and I reluctantly found myself on what I now considered a “dreaded plane”. Also something I typically love. I won’t get into details in this blog, but my take away from this journey was very much the same as my first adventure, with this experience now including airports, hotels, and restaurants out of necessity. Regarding every element of both trips, I witnessed practically all businesses doing their part to help keep employees and consumers safe and protected while still being able to provide a service. Side note: if you can look past the changes and inconveniences, the ingenuity and creativity of humans can be seen everywhere right now.
Months have passed and as we all know, number-of-cases wise we are no better off that at the beginning, at least not here in the USA nor my mother land in the UK. Please don’t get me wrong – I believe in all that we have done and continue to do. I personally argue the case for a mask and social distancing and understand the importance of flattening the curve. I still have not seen most of my friends or loved ones since this thing broke out. However, as this war wages on, I do not see how we can sustain additional months of lock-ins and shutdowns.
As the owner of a travel company, I will admit that my own world has been thrown seriously off kilter shall we say. However, I am blessed with low overhead and loyal clients, many of whom are optimistic about the future. I honestly feel my team and I have much to look forward to once we get through this – and we will get through this. My personal stance comes more from what I see happening across our planet. Huge casualties are happening globally as a result of the Pandemic. We all read on the news about the financial situation of the airlines, hotel chains, and Disney, which are upsetting to me and ultimately impact us all, but it’s the little stories that never make the news that really tell the extent of a huge toll. And there are so many that I can cite from firsthand knowledge. Countless small hotels, restaurants, dive centers, and other hospitality-linked businesses have already been lost. People’s dreams and only source of income, along with their life savings have crashed and burned. The citizens of some countries that are essentially 100% reliant on tourism literally don’t know where their next meal is coming from. I have it from several credible sources that one of my favorite islands that is extremely popular with divers and tourists alike, has a surge of wives and daughters soliciting themselves on the streets as a way to feed their families now that their respectable family income has dried up. I have attended countless government and health council virtual meetings of island nations (did you know you can do that?) and listened to them weigh up the risk to their people from Coronavirus versus watching their island waste away. According to many sources, 10% of every job in the world is generated by tourism and it generates over 10% of the global Gross Domestic product. Before the Pandemic, the WTTC projected that between 2017 – 2027, tourism would be responsible for a quarter of all new jobs created. Simply put, there are millions of people, and millions more of their dependents, that do not have the luxury of waiting for a cure or vaccine. Add to that the domino effect of these businesses large and small no longer patronizing entities outside of the tourism industry such as food and cleaning supplies and services, shipping, uniforms, fuel, and power. Numbers that don’t even make the “travel industry” victim count and yet are suffering the same consequence.
As someone who puts the environment above nearly all else and who tries to see the glass half full, I took great comfort and pleasure in reading various stories how Mother Nature seemed to be taking back her own during the initial absence of humans. However as time goes on, there is much discussion on how she could ultimately suffer in many areas too. There are numerous articles regarding the consequences of over tourism versus no tourism and they make an interesting argument. Unless humans leave the planet completely, much of the world relies on our protection. Marine park fees, national park fees, safari park fees, and the tourism dollars generated to see these places are needed or conservation efforts cannot continue. In the case against shark finning or the sale of ivory, we have all read about how much that animal is worth more alive rather than in a bowl of soup or used as decoration. But if there are no longer tourists, the only sales left to be made are the ones that make me weep. And with global poverty on the rise, when we think back to the town where a man is now watching his wife sell herself to feed their children, you bet he is going to go out and fish for all he can catch or lead poachers to a grand prize.
Simply put, the impact is catastrophic and unquantifiable.
Fortunately, right from the start, the travel industry recognized and anticipated living alongside the virus rather than waiting for it to go away. The good news is there is a wealth of studies and trials of potential solutions that have been taking place quietly since the beginning of the outbreak. Until recently, these have not been widely implemented because they have been waiting on governments to enact a globally coordinated response. It is the preferable way for us to move forward and is very much continuing to be campaigned for. However, as this appears to be stalled, many of the main travel industry stakeholders and/or smaller nations dependent on tourism are now taking it upon themselves to introduce their own initiatives. These currently come in a variety of forms that are fluid as situations evolve and we learn more, but generally most hinge on testing shortly before departure, upon arrival, or both, as well as regulations limiting numbers once at a destination.
At the time of writing this, there are approximately 25 destinations Americans can currently travel to for pleasure. Mexico requires nothing more than your temperature taken to enter, however the rest entail testing and, in most cases it’s a lab-conducted test (commonly known as PCR), before departing the country of origin.
Avid scuba divers are a different breed. Once we learn how to breathe underwater, many of us find ourselves gasping for air on land. It is often what we work for and for some what we live for. While admittedly it’s ultimately a luxury and a privilege, for a lot of divers it is also a necessity to our mental health and much more. This makes us a hardy bunch, often willing to go great lengths or put up with a lot of inconveniences in order to scratch that itch. So while we are nowhere near pre-Coronavirus numbers, as traveling is once again possible, the Deep Blue phones have thankfully started ringing again with the demand to travel somewhere, anywhere, ASAP. Due to the ease of access in more ways than one, that means almost all our travelers have elected Mexico.
You will hear no complaints from me – I love Mexico for countless reasons. I will gladly and wholeheartedly sell it every day and have been dreaming myself of her turquoise waters and spectacular reefs for months. But I am also aware of the many other destinations sorely needing our support and waiting to welcome us. Even more so, my work is my passion and my business is my baby. I personally feel it’s time, if done responsibly, to travel again and professionally I owe it to my clients to live what I sell.
I recently got wind of the possibility of getting in the water with humpback whales in Costa Rica. It’s the tail end of the season, but the country literally only started allowing residents from my state in last week and this is the one window of opportunity I have for the foreseeable future. A breathtaking country with abundant life above and below the surface and conservation efforts I applaud, Costa Rica will open to residents of all 50 states on November 1st. In order to travel there, I must obtain a PCR test 72 hours prior to my flight departure time and meet a few other requirements. I do not know anyone who has done this yet, but I am going for it! I don’t have any kind of inside track or connections, despite being in the travel industry. These are international mandates everyone, including myself, must comply with. My experience will be the same as any one of my clients seeking to travel right now.
The coming days I will share my journey along the way, the good, the bad and if it happens, the ugly. It’s great to have you along!
Photos courtesy of Bill Beard
