Vacation travel now?

Personal Finances Budget Travel/Vacations
1

After waiting for over 2 years to do any travel, and continuing to cancel any trip we had planned for months and months ahead, we finally took a trip from California to Toronto Canada, in order to do the lovely rail trip across Canada to Vancouver, and home…

Well, because of delays at airports, 4 days after arrival home, DH was rushed to the hospital barely breathing, and on oxygen for 6 of his 7 days in the hospital, out of Intensive Care the 4th day, but isolated and surrounded by people in armour. Really bad case if Covid, and the only resident of our 800, in the Old People’s Home, to go to the hospital. Of course I have been tested every day.

After nearly 4 weeks of monitoring oxygen, nurses and therapists coming to our apartment etc, he finally took off the heart monitor this afternoon as instructed, and was allowed a shower…big excitement! And he is walking again, albeit with a walker, but very tired.

However we are VERY doubtful about going on our trip to Ashland Oregon in September…

12 Likes
2

Hope that your husband recovers without any long term problems.

Currently, Oregon has a very high COVID rate.

3

Hope he continues to improve. We’ve decided not to travel to San Diego for our nephew’s early September wedding. Between the cost and rising numbers, we’re staying home. Hope to do our usual winter trip in Jan/Feb.

4

Your experience isn’t unique, travel is still risky! My daughter called last night. After minimizing contact and avoiding travel for so long she and another doctor flew out west and took one of the train tours. Both got covid, ended up having urgent care medical expenses and renting a car for over 2K $ to drive a couple of thousand miles home.

3 Likes
5

Did you guys use masks the entire time? I’m pretty sure the people around you mostly didn’t (if they’re anything like the locals in the Phoenix area).

Just curious. We’re still pretty regular about masks, even though others seem to think this is over and done. So far, to the best of our knowledge, none of us have had COVID.

6

After nearly 4 weeks of monitoring oxygen, nurses and therapists coming to our apartment etc, he finally took off the heart monitor this afternoon as instructed, and was allowed a shower…big excitement! And he is walking again, albeit with a walker, but very tired.

Though it sounds as though he has a long road ahead, at least he is now moving in the right direction. That is good news!

The only way we are planning on traveling these days is by car to vacation rental single family homes. We had Covid in February 2020, including the dog who then had long Covid for about 18 months of hell. Being on prednisone for his lungs, he had to go out to empty his bladder every few hours, and was so ill that the vet tried to talk us into putting him down…twice. But we saw that there was still quality of life for him and we traded off being the one to get out of bed endlessly, letting the other get a decent night sleep.

The rebound in good health has been stunning, and we are now walking 3.5 miles a day with him. He is back to sleeping through the night, and off the prescription meds for his lungs. He of course can’t be vaccinated, so we go through life double masked in fear of coming home with an asymptomatic Covid that we unknowingly give him.

We have a lakefront rental home on Lake Norman in Charlotte, NC reserved for 2 weeks end of September. Our son from Atlanta will fly in and work from home, and we will visit with our youngest on the weekends, who just moved there in March and can’t take time off of work. It has a large screened in porch and lots of kayaks and paddle boards to play on. We may even drive down to get Eldest, but he is quite good about masking up and staying masked in his N-95s.

Sis recently got Covid while on a trip, flying home while contagious. She even passed out at security, where they called the EMTs to check her out. Not once did they ask about Covid, and they let her board. She was masked, but IMO the lack of consideration for those around her was so stunning, that we have decided not to invite her to the lake. It’s clear to me that our values are not the same wrt Covid, and she is a risk I am not willing to take. Since we have no idea if what used to be considered common courtesy will be followed by fellow travelers, we will only travel in our own bubble.

IP

2 Likes
7

Not once did they ask about Covid, and they let her board. She was masked, but IMO the lack of consideration for those around her was so stunning, that we have decided not to invite her to the lake. It’s clear to me that our values are not the same wrt Covid, and she is a risk I am not willing to take. Since we have no idea if what used to be considered common courtesy will be followed by fellow travelers, we will only travel in our own bubble.

IP

A relative of my step-son gave 5 members of the household that had gathered over July 4th COVID. This included his fiancé. Both were still COVID positive when they flew back to Oregon where they gave it to his cousin who picked them up at the airport. Unknown how many others they infected during their trip.

3 Likes
8

I’m so sorry to hear this.

We just came back unscathed from 7 days in Norway transiting through Newark both inbound and outbound.

It’s a crapshoot.

B

1 Like
9

We’re just back from 3 days tripping at lake Tahoe… Rarely saw anyone making, ate inside a couple times, again, not even was the wait help masked… So we’ll see how we made out in a few days…

Note from our DD’s inlaws, both carful, both shots & 2 boosters, he came back from a flight to Houston, got it, apparently passed it along to his wife…

We try to stay outdoors but… No catching any plane for a long time…

DS & family are stopping by tomorrow, no birthday dinner for the GS’s, will pick up a pizza (Old Chicago)for them to take home & bake, all outdoors… Younger GS, the fellow with all the heart problems is heading off to SoCal for college, so nobody wants to cause any problems for him…

Crazy times…

1 Like
10

So we’ll see how we made out in a few days…

Weco, I don’t mean to get into your business, but you posted about it, so: if you’re concerned about Covid and you saw that no one in the (indoor) restaurant was masked, why did you go ahead and eat there?

2 Likes
11

Well, we’re vaccinated, 2x boosted, and maintained distances as we could… And there were limited options for food, did a deli take out, we hadn’t brought any food, knowing there was a bear problem, the rental had said it included a continental breakfast, well, that was a couple crunch bars and a tangerine… Rustic, small, but what we could find at the last minute… More people than facilities in the area… There was outdoor seating, but an hour+ wait times, no reservations… So kinda trapped to what was available…

Normally we’d have had a larger place, maybe a kitchenette, and have brought food with, we did well to get ourselves and too much stuff, even without food… So for ~$200/night, pretty rustic, a few calls to the desk to make stuff work, the first day, we got in late, so next morning, reality popped up, missed breakfast, flat tire, near zero fixit shops nearby…

We did make it to Palisades, the old Squaw Valley Olympic site, took the tram to the top at 8,200 feet, wandered a bit, but a lot of stairs, elevator broken, but beautiful views out over the Tahoe area… But again, very limited services, only a mini store, drinks… And a lot of huffin’ n puffin’…

Oh, and as we left, gassed up at $6.699/gallon for 87 octane… A record $145 fillup… ~22 gallons of my 38 gallon tank…

Another adventure… Time to visit SIL on the way up, cousin that evening, mission accomplished…

2 Likes
12

Well, we’re vaccinated, 2x boosted, and maintained distances as we could.

Respectfully, so did Fauci, so did Biden, and so did DW and I, except for 15 minutes to eat on a trans-Atlantic flight for which everyone on board had to test negative within 24 hours prior to departure. We all caught Covid.

The current vaccines and boosters remain very effective at preventing hospitalization and mortality. They are not particularly effective at preventing infection that could knock you down for at least a week and that you could (unknowingly) pass on to others.

These days, if there are more than roughly 25 people in a room (or restaurant, or small business, or airplane), it’s almost a sure bet that at least one of them is infectious with the Covid virus. If there’s, say, a dozen people, it’s more or less a coin flip. With this latest super-contagious variant, if you’re unmasked and in the immediate vicinity of one of those unmasked infected persons in a closed space for more than perhaps a few minutes, you’ll very likely catch Covid from them.

So, DW and I will eat outside, thanks. And if the outside tables are full and/or crowded, we’ll get takeout and eat under a tree somewhere.

4 Likes
13

…did a deli take out

Oh, so you didn’t actually eat inside? (That bit was buried in the post.) If that’s the case, then I’m much relieved!

14

… ate inside a couple times, again, not even was the wait help masked…

Or you did eat inside. I’m quite confused now, so I’ll drop it.

15

We just tested this morning, in anticipation of my son & family stopping by later today as his two son’s birthdays are coming along… Both of us tested negative.

In the family, a few scattered Covid cases, a couple had a rough go, but everyone is vaccinated, boosted, we all test prior to any gatherings, masking when with my son’s family… Masking, testing while caring for our DD in the last couple years, so never to be a cause of adding to her problems, her passing was unrelated to Covid… Her inlaws, now living in NV, recently both contracted covid, likely from his air travel to Houston on business, so even their care, masking left them vulnerable…

An old work buddy, like me, long retired, but he’s a stroke survivor, split with his gambler wife, had to move in with his daughter & family, all deniers, no masks, caught it soon after, but his shots, boosters, made it survivable…

So far so good…

1 Like
16

Well, the deli takeout was only one instance, we’d gotten in so late the only grocer/deli was close at 7 PM, so this was the next day after the tire trouble… two other times, Dinner one evening on the lakeside, breakfast the next morning on our way out of town, heading home were inside, very busy spots, the dinner place had outside seating, but over an hour wait for a table, and 20 minute wait for an inside table, relatively well spaced… We also had lunch back on our way up with my SIL, in Loomis, indoors, but also well separated tables, but the earliest lunch reservation we could get was 2:30 PM! Then drop her off back in Roseville so we were late getting over Donner and down to Tahoma… Long day, very long day…

1 Like
17

Here’s the spot where we had dinner, couple margaritas… Very tasty lamb pops with a jalapeno sauce, calamari, salad… Za’s in Tahoe City…

https://ibb.co/tbH9P8p

I avoid pasta, generally, but they do have some very tempting items on their menu…

https://zaslakefront.com

1 Like
18

we are VERY doubtful about going on our trip to Ashland Oregon in September…

In the last 24h, the McKinney fire has trashed Ashland’s air quality. Here’s a link to a crowdsourced AQI monitor at the Elizabethan theater:

https://map.purpleair.com/1/mAQI/a10/p604800/cC0#13.82/42.19…

PM 2.5 now 223.

Of course, there’s a month to go before late September, and comprehensive changes can happen in a couple of days. Were I planning any outdoors vacation in the West this summer, I’d keep a close eye on the map - especially if someone was recovering from a pulmonary insult already -

Best of luck -

–sutton

2 Likes