Traveling in a new post pandemic world

Our collective memories are short and even the worst crisis becomes forgotten history in a matter of weeks. Even after covid restrictions plagued the entire world for months on end, any opportunity for normalcy was quickly grabbed earnestly. Travel was one such. 

I don't know when the travel bug bit me. But I suppose when you move to a small island no longer than 1,000km, no wider than 500km; when you are 8,000km from your hometown; and when your only sibling lives another 8,000km away in the opposite direction, you become a traveller. 

After a day trip to Frankfurt on business in February 2020, planes, and plans, were literally grounded because of the mysterious new highly infectious virus that reached every part of this well connected world that we live in. I remained in the same country for 597 days. This is the longest I have stayed in any country after my very first international trip (to London) in 2010. (I know this because I have a nifty little Excel file with all my travel dates so I can fill the travel history of the last 10 years every time I apply for a new visa). Of course, we did travel within the UK, which makes for another post. When international travel opened up briefly in between, it did not seem worth it with the numerous covid tests and long queues, apart from the risk of catching the virus itself. 

Finally, we went away for a few days to the always sunny Canary Islands, after K and I were double vaccinated, exempting us from covid tests. Unlike the UK, mask adherence was high in these Spanish islands. 

        Lanzarote was incredibly different from Tenerife where we previously spent a long weekend years ago. Lanzarote is more volcanic. We went to the Timanfaya National park with a geologist who explained the unique volcanic activity and the rock formations. The vineyards are special too. The locals learned to dig into the mountain side and create barriers against wind, to grow citrus fruits and grapes. Apart from that we stayed in this really nice resort but resort life is not for us and we couldn't wait to get out everyday.

The very next month we flew to Athens for a quick weekend break to meet friends. In Athens too, mask adherence was high. In addition, we were checked our vaccine status at all the restaurants. 

     I had wanted to go to Athens for the Parthenon, after seeing the Colosseum in Rome. But the Acropolis of Athens was largely in ruins and the Parthenon was left largely to imagination. The Ancient Agora was a lot more interesting to me, seeing where the market was held and where the weights were calibrated and where the first voting took place. Yet again however, a lot was left to imagination.

Since then, restrictions further reduced and we made plans to go to India for a family wedding when there were no longer meaningful constraints on the attendees. But that's when Omicron hit and additional checks and restrictions were put in place. K and I took a booster shot each and braved the travel. We were mostly lucky through out the trip but towards the end Omicron spread rampantly. We shut ourselves India to ensure safe travels back. 

Omicron, however, seemed benign and restrictions were quickly dropped. We flew to Washington, in the US, for a week long family holiday and there were no more checks. But it was there that we caught the bug. Five of the six of us ended up testing positive, including me, losing my bragging rights to not catching it. K retrains the rights!

With no travel restrictions whatsoever and with the virus passing through us, it was a lot easier to travel. The following months I was in Barcelona, Lisbon and Stockholm partly for work and partly to travel. No one stopped me or checked me or were even worried about the virus.

I've been Barcelona many times and I still love it just as much as I loved it when I first saw it. But there's little to add. Going to Lisbon and Stockholm reignited in me the early Euro trip wonder and the charm of Euro city walking tours. 

Lisbon, the poetic city of explorers 

I've been to so many European cities that they all begin to look very similar. Yet Lisbon was different!

It sits on seven hills, so there are a lot of ups and downs. Some roads are so step there are just steps instead. The main square of Lisbon has the statue of Luis de Camoes and is named after him. He was not king or a politician or a warrior. He was a poet. The national day of Portugal is 10 June, to commemorate this poet's death anniversary. Not far from this square is a statue of Fernando Pessoa in a chair, in conversation with an empty chair. Fernando Pessoa was a writer who wrote under his own as well as 75 others. He didn't call them pen names since it didn't do justice to the entire personalities he created for them. Hence the empty chair to symbolise that Pessoa was never alone, and always in the company of one of his many personalities that had their own unique views of the world and writing styles. Just down the road is the world's oldest continuously functioning book shop, The Betrand Bookstore, where I bought Fernando Pessoa's Book of Disquiet. I didn't know that Portugal has amongst the oldest country borders. The Spanish dictator Franco marched on to Portugal but couldn't win so instead he cut off the country and set a siege. This led Portugal to go the other side, into the Atlantic, becominh a naval force that the sea route to India. The city was not touched by the WWII because Portugal sided with neither and instead sided with commerce trading with both sides. But the riches was lost in personal glory. When the king led his wealth and troupes to South America waging war, the army turned against him. 

Stockholm, city of islands

Stockholm is very subdued, like it's biggest known brand, IKEA. Everything is sleek and pale, apart from a couple of jazzy golden tops of buildings. Like the opera house which stands at odds with the rest of bleakness. We took a boat tour of the various islands as the boat sails through the various locks. We took a walking tour with a history teacher but it being off season, we were the only two people in it. But that's where we learnt of the protesters - against Nazism back in WWII and against climate catastrophe in the current world. Interesting to see the Vasa Museum where the ship Vasa is on display. When the Vasa was created in 1620, it was the greatest ship of it's times. But when it set sail, it sank in 20min as the very people the waved it off watched it sink. This is what happens when you surround yourself with yes-men. No one tells you what a disaster the plan was from the beginning. The ship was salvaged and is on display. We also went to the Nobel Prize Museum but it was more boring than I thought. There are no actual artifacts, just replicas. We did an interesting walking tour of the Vikings. Not a lot is left to see and it was mostly just a speech but the Viking runes spread over the city were interesting.

I have a bit of a self imposed break from travel again! I've not braved travel in the third and the so called fourth trimester. New travels will be interesting with a little one in tow.