Hired Bookings Up 2021

[grounded]

My wife and I have booked for 3 weeks from 28th June. Unfortunately the prospects of our making it seem to be receding rather than improving. The confused (is it just me?) situation in the UK is only compounded by us here in New Zealand being at the back end of a very long queue for the vaccine and it is seemingly unlikely we will be able to get the vaccine prior to boarding long-haul flights to Europe at the end of May.

In anticipation of such difficulties we did contact Richardson's in mid-July of 2020 in an effort to book a boat for June 2022 to spend our 50th wedding anniversary on the Broads. Our first choice of boat for 2022 was already booked (or reserved) so folk are indeed booking a loooong way ahead!

Our fingers are still very much crossed for this year.

Chris

[Vaughan]

Only a couple of days ago, Downing St predicted that the full lockdown would last until Easter.  Now, they have predicted it will last until the Summer.

Me? I'm not predicting anything, including the next time I might see Norfolk, after 18months.

But I am not making advance bookings on anything either.

[Chelsea14Ian]

Last summer our trip to Cornwall  was cancelled  due to Covid.Re booked for June this year.The way things are going.I will not hold my breath. If it happens  great, but just wait and see.

The main thing is to get this virus under control. Think we're getting  there,but it is so close yet so far.

[andyg]

18 minutes ago, Vaughan said:

Only a couple of days ago, Downing St predicted that the full lockdown would last until Easter.  Now, they have predicted it will last until the Summer.

Me? I'm not predicting anything, including the next time I might see Norfolk, after 18months.

But I am not making advance bookings on anything either.

Very wise Vaughan, I saw an article yesterday that easyjet are reporting, spring, summer booking are up by 250% compared with last year. Madness in my opion, I do believe international travel should be the last thing to come off the travel restriction list. I'm sorry that would have an affect on you personally but its the only logical thing to do. We have tried opening up safe corridors and look what happened. Greek Islands that had no covid infections or very few suddenly overwhelmed by infections it was the same in the canary Islands after re opening to tourists. With all European governments taking different approaches to their vacation programmes I feel we need at least another 12 months to evaluate how affective its been. 

[Cal]

We should have been going to Belgium on a hire boat last Easter which was cancelled. We swapped it to this Easter and changed the destination from Belgium to the Thames. Looks like we won't be going there either this year.

 

We are going to take a full refund this time and put the money to some use at home!

[MaceSwinger]

48 minutes ago, andyg said:

Very wise Vaughan, I saw an article yesterday that easyjet are reporting, spring, summer booking are up by 250% compared with last year. Madness in my opion, I do believe international travel should be the last thing to come off the travel restriction list. I'm sorry that would have an affect on you personally but its the only logical thing to do. We have tried opening up safe corridors and look what happened. Greek Islands that had no covid infections or very few suddenly overwhelmed by infections it was the same in the canary Islands after re opening to tourists. With all European governments taking different approaches to their vacation programmes I feel we need at least another 12 months to evaluate how affective its been. 

A Fijian chap I very often see in the smoking area at work (before I packed it in in December that is) is of a similar opinion. Fiji had only 4 cases, all of which were Chinese nationals that the Chinese government had transferred to the island because they paid for the hospital. He had to make the heartbreaking decision to spend Christmas in the UK, his adopted second-home nation, but not at all where he wanted to be. Epidemic becomes pandemic through travel. What was it I read? The virus can't move. We move it.

A friend of mine from work decided, for reasons known only to her, to bugger off to Spain last March. She was rounded up at the hotel and sent home ultimately. I heard to rifting my sergeant major gave her from the other end of the building

[JennyMorgan]

I'm afraid that I have to agree with Vaughan on this one. As for Easy Jets customers, madness! 

So what to expect? Inoculations look like continuing well into the summer, jabs that don't immediately become effective, so what can we plan for? Living in hope might be the answer! 

[chrisdobson45]

I hope for a new sort of normality for the summer (meaning last week in July to first week in September) such that lockdown restrictions are relaxed for the many but the vulnerable are still protected. I see social distancing and masks being the new norm, and many of those things that we've all become used to and have taken for granted being a thing of the past (such as crowded pubs & restaurants, large outdoor gatherings such as festivals, indoor concerts, theatre, etc). 

I'm missing travelling for pleasure, there's so much that we want to do, not going to the far flung corners of the world, done that, worn the T shirt, etc, but closer to home, north of Scotland and the Western Isles, Norfolk & Suffolk, Cornwall, The Gower and a trip back to the Valleys to see where my dad was born and brought up.

What brought this all home this week was our 5 year old lab was suspected of having a life ending illness and in the three days of worry whilst referrals were sought we talked about all the places we had been with Jasper and all the places we wanted to take him. He had the bestest of times on a boat on the Broads three years ago, every day was an adventure for him, whether barking at the swans or trying to leap into the water wherever we were, he loved it and we're booked on Brinks Tempo in July.

Well, two vets suspicions were proven incorrect by £4,000 and a day of tests and imaging at Pride Scarsdale Vet Centre in Derby, there's no tumour, but a fatty cyst that will not been any further treatment so once he's back to his old self we've raods to travel, rivers to cruise and there's lots of swans to bark at...