I have not shared an update with my clients, readers, and randoms who hit my website since last February, so I thought now would be a good time. Since the start of the pandemic, I personally have traveled on 23 flights, to 4 other countries, 2 other continents, and have had experiences with all sorts of destinations. Additionally, my clients have traveled extensively over the past year.

WHAT IS THE CURRENT STATE OF TRAVEL?

In a word? CRAZY. Travel is absolutely crazy. It’s a feeding frenzy. People are re-booking their canceled trips and using their travel credits. There is a pent-up demand resulting from people being in quarantine for the better part of last year. And people appreciate the freedom to travel now more than ever. It’s where families are spending their disposable income because we have learned as a society that our experiences together are more valuable than materialistic objects.

In some ways, however, this is a difficult question to answer because depending who you talk to, travel is thriving and for others, it is not. Cruising is still facing its fair share of difficulties right now, trying to navigate (pun not really intended) safety, customer expectations, and laws that span different countries and destinations. The majority of Master Travel’s business lies in adventure and family travel, with destinations such as Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean. Because of this, I can share that our business is thriving right now. So from my personal perspective, travel is bouncing back harder than ever. I wrote about this back in February when my phone started to ring non-stop, you can see that article HERE, because not much has changed.

PLANNING IS SLOW, THANKS FOR YOUR PATIENCE

For those of you who are used to receiving a travel proposal within a few days of your request, those days are long gone for now. It is taking our suppliers a much longer time than normal to come back to us with rates and availability. The demand is high, the job pool is low: Travel providers are understaffed and overworked right now because of the demand.

If you have worked with me in the past six months, you know that it is taking us sometimes 2-3 weeks to get you a proposal. And this isn’t because we aren’t working hard at it. Katherine Ong joined Master Travel three months ago to help me with the workload. Rather than freeing up time, she has just widened the highway to allow for more traffic. Which is to say, we are BUSY and our suppliers are slower than normal. So we appreciate the patience our clients have exercised while waiting to receive travel proposals.

IF YOU HAVEN’T PLANNED YOUR TRAVEL, YOU BETTER HAVE STARTED YESTERDAY, I AM NOT JOKING!

In the travel world, we refer to the December holiday period as “festive”. Recently, a new client called, dusting off her shoulders with pride when she said, “I am so proud of myself, I am ready to plan our December holiday and I am early for once, SIX MONTHS OUT” And you know what? I applaud her effort, I, too, would think that six months in advance is PLENTY of time to plan a trip. But sadly, I had to share that she was very LATE to the game, that most holiday beach destinations are sold out (the luxury destinations that we normally work with). There is not a villa to be found in Jamaica, the USVI , and more. Hotel rooms are filled to the max in Mexico, Turks and Caicos, and St Lucia.

Is there still space left? Yes….. but you need to be flexible, manage your expectations, and expect to pay very high prices for Festive Travel. There is no compromising on the 7-10 day minimums, and you better make sure you can find space on a flight before booking the hotel! Because inventory is so low, and it takes a tremendous amount of time to find desirable space, our fee for Festive planning has entered the “last minute” phase of our terms and conditions.

WHAT ABOUT TRAVEL FOR NEXT YEAR, CAN I WAIT TO PLAN?

People are planning their travel out further than ever, frankly, it’s a little shocking! I am currently working on many trips for July and August 2022, and even some destinations for 2023! Spring Break is also filling up faster than normal, so if you think you might want to go, please plan accordingly, as in now.

Of course you can wait, but the more you wait, the less choice you will have. I think it’s better to plan and cancel (if you had to) than it is to not plan and have no where to go.

HOT DESTINATIONS: GREECE GREECE GREECE and did I mention GREECE? ALso, anywhere in the Caribbean is super popular.

IS IT SAFE TO TRAVEL RIGHT NOW?

I am not going to answer whether or not I think it’s “safe” to travel right now. We all have a different comfort level with regards to the pandemic, we all have different risk makeup, some of you are vaccinated, while others are not, and thus, I am not qualified to tell you “Sure, it’s safe, go on out there”. But I can share my experience and offer advice on how to navigate things. What I can say is, try to not look at crazy headlines meant to panic the public and raise more clicks and ad revenue for “reporters”.. Instead, I would look at statistics from unbiased and reliable sources, do your own critical thinking, and decide if where you live is more dangerous from a covid perspective, than where you want to go. And if you are going to read a headline, and draw conclusions, at the very least, don’t just read the headline and walk away, read the article! Many times you will find the information within an article doesn’t exactly match the sensational headlines.

IS IT WORTH TRAVELING RIGHT NOW?

(Lets assume you have a comfort level for travel right now for the sake of this information)

With the pandemic, monitoring the destinations where you want to travel is our number one priority. And this has become a full-time job unto itself. The bottom line is this: You may have to jump thru some hoops to travel right now, fill out forms, present your vaccination card, get a covid test, but once the nuisances are dealt with, you can go forward, travel, and enjoy yourself. I truly believe that the small hurdles, which we assist you with, are well worth the rewards of traveling.

And here is why: Depending on where you want to go, there are very few crowds of tourists. This is especially true for Europe and Africa. When I traveled to Egypt in November 2020, there were almost no tourists to be found. When I went to the Valley of the Kings, I saw maybe 4 other tourists the entire time I was there. I spent my time in King Tut’s tomb ALONE, with no one else there, no lines. The same is true for every site we visited. As a travel advisor, this made me sad. As a tourist, it was an opportunity of a life time. As a human, my heart goes out to the countries whose economies are suffering from a lack of visitors.

In Croatia, Greece, and the Meditteranean coast in general, there are no large cruise lines dumping hordes of tourists into the destinations where you want to visit. In fact, there are no large cruise lines anywhere right now, so if you have a destination where you are interested in visiting, that is typically crowded because of the cruise lines, it might just be the right time for you!

My clients just returned from Paris. A couple with their 3 young children, and they had the most incredible time. The streets of Paris in August are typically not crowded with Parisiens, as it is the time they go on holiday, But they are typically crowded with tourists during the Summer and even Fall, and right now, the crowds are greatly diminished. They were able to enjoy Versailles without rubbing elbows with strangers, for example, and they also enjoyed dining, both indoors and out, without droves of people.

I went to Italy last month and experienced the same as my clients. The sites where I visited were extremely pleasant and uncrowded. I did not have to wait in line for anything, and I didn’t have to worry about being in large crowds of people. It was amazing really.

So again, depending on your comfort level, it can be VERY WORTH IT to travel right now.

What is going on in the EU, can Americans go or not?

If you are like me, you probably saw many confusing headlines over the past few days, and think that Americans are banned from the EU, but that is simply not the case. The EU has recommended a travel ban for Americans, but it is simply that, a recommendation. In the same way the CDC often recommends banning certain countries for travel (and the list was long before Covid 19), the European Council removed the US from its ‘safe list’ of countries. But what does the headline not tell you?

The ban clearly differentiates between vaccinated and unvaccinated travelers. The EU’s recommendation goes as far to say that FULLY VACCINATED TRAVELERS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO TRAVEL, but only if they can produce a 72 hour negative covid test prior to arrival, so this is nothing new.

So, simply put, if you are vaccinated, you can travel to the open countries.

WHERE CAN AMERICANS TRAVEL RIGHT NOW?

The list is long, so it is probably not a good exercise to write where you can travel right now. So I would rather share where our clients have recently traveled, and where we are planning a lot of travel:

CARRIBEAN: Turks and Caicos, Puerto Rico, Bahamas, Jamaica, and St Lucia are some of the most popular Destinations. Cancun and the Riviera Maya are also extremely popular.

EUROPE: Italy, France, Spain, Greece, Iceland, the UK, Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Albania…. All these are quite accessible to US travelers right now.

AFRICA: Kenya, Tanzania, Namibia, Rwanda, Egypt, Morocco

CENTRAL AMERICA: Ecuador, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Nicaragua,

Contact us and we can provide you with any restrictions you may face in your destination of choice

WHAT’S THE DEAL WITH THE AIRLINES RIGHT NOW AND WHY DO MY FLIGHTS KEEP CHANGING?

If you have been in possession of a foreign (or maybe even domestic) airline ticket, then I would bet my life that your routes have changed multiple times before your travel. And many of those changes aren’t really in your favor. Like everywhere else, the airlines are bouncing back slowly, with a shortage of pilots and workers to help keep maintain their schedules. Another reason is that the airlines are trying to guess the demand when they make their schedules. The Wall Street Journal does a good analysis HERE

How to deal with the 9 hour hold times to get through? My advice is don’t. When you book your air, please use our Air Department. They will help you with the changes and the rules, no waiting on hold. The ticketing fees for this service are the best money spent right now. I have booked several of my flights with points, and as a result, I have not been fortunate enough to use my own air department. The customer service, or lack thereof, is brutal right now.

BOTTOM LINE

Please plan early, Please be patient. Please expect the unexpected. Please work with a trusted travel advisor.