Travel SRQ to JHR in PANDEMIC

Sometimes, people just have to travel despite warnings from everyone not to go anywhere. Such was the case recently when I felt I just had to leave the USA where I had been illegal for over eight months. I’m sure the USA authorities will understand my reasons when I apply to travel back to the USA in the future. The flights that I booked on my favorite airline during 2020 had all been cancelled but, as the vaccines began to kick in during 2021, it became easier to return to England. 

We normally take a non-stop flight from Tampa to Gatwick but our favorite airline had cancelled all their flights from there and everywhere else as it happened. Surprisingly, none of the airlines running transAtlantic routes were running non-stop flights from Tampa so I had to look for the best flight from SRQ Sarasota airport to connect with an airport from where I could fly directly to London. 

By May 2021, there were a number of direct flights from different airports but, to cut a long  series of deliberations short, I settled on Atlanta. The first reason for this choice was the fact that Virgin Atlantic ran flights from Atlanta on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The second reason was the fact that they used the 787 Dreamliner, my favorite plane. The third reason was that they are in cahoots with DELTA which has always had frequent flights from SRQ Sarasota Airport to Atlanta. 

That’s the easy bit! Now for the PANDEMIC rules. 

First requirement: I had to be tested in the USA clear of COVID-90 three days before arrival in England. This would be difficult because they take up to FOUR days to send the result after the sample being couriered to a laboratory. 

The second requirement was that I had to book two tests the second and the eight day after arrival in England. The company I chose would send me a secret code for myself alone. 

The third  requirement was that I had to fill in a long three page interrogation for Border Control in London. This would include the secret code for my two tests in England. 

Tempted, as I was to give up any ideas about travel back to Blighty, I soldiered on with plans. I booked an afternoon flight to Atlanta then the Virgin Atlantic’s late night crossing to Heathrow London. 

First came the PCR test for COVID-19. This was the first test that the Longboat CVS ran on Tuesday morning. It was very efficiently supervised and the result came by email on Thursday. I had overcome the first hurdle – or so I thought. 

I was very happy with the masks we had been wearing because they were military combat N-99 masks with exit valves. They protect the USER whereas the normal N-95 masks merely protect people FROM the user. Some people have the idiotic notion that it is “manly” NOT to wear a mask. This is nonsense because these “manly” people are simply scattering their breathe all over everybody and this travels easily through a N95 mask. The problem with the N99 mask is that it ONLY protects the wearer as a valve lets the air the wearer breathes out into the environment. But the masks come with little round stickers to block this exhaust valve.

“We don’t allow masks with valves on our planes” was the greeting I had from the lady at the DELTA desk at SRQ. She shook her head when I said there was a provision for blocking the valve. So I decided to wear an N95 mask which protects my fellow passengers on top of my valved N99 mask which protects ME. I did not announce my decision but it was obviously an efficient way to solve the problem. 

SRQ is a tiny airport. Driving past on the road, we used to see one, two or even three planes at the terminal. But recently this has all changed. More and more airlines are flying from airports all over the USA and Canada especially during the pandemic when nobody is able to take International flights. 

So I was amazed to see how congested SRQ was. The flight to Atlanta was fully booked! I was also disappointed to see so many of the “ultra thin”, “sit up straight” seats packed into a very nice “brand new” airbus. It’s only a short flight fromSRQ to ATL so I had no problems with my N95 over my N99. In fact, I was surprised how comfortable it was to wear two masks. 

We arrived in the domestic terminal at Atlanta which seemed quite remote from the International Terminal. It was a long walk past all the domestic gates but the destinations on the gates were magic to me. I still remember my first trip around the states in a car. I had played a tune from almost every city we passed. So I enjoyed seeing destinations like “St Louis” from the blues we all know,Kamsas of  “Kansas City Stomp”, “Chattanooga”, Chicago of course, and many others. 

I eventually found Gate F2 in the International Terminal after quite a long train ride. I bought a strange drink and made myself comfortable eating my tea and watching planes landing and taking off while waiting for the gate to open. 

After waiting for a time, a nice man from the Virgin Atlantic desk came over and informed me that I had to have my documents checked at the desk before I would be cleared to travel to UK. So I showed my three pages of Border control questionnaire, my booking and secret code for the two tests I had booked in England then my CVS COVID test taken three days earlier. 

Slightly terrified, I watched him survey the date of the test.. The problem was that I had taken the test three days before I travelled. I subsequently discovered that the rules prescribed a test taken three days before the arrival in London. Taking a look at the date then taking a look at me, I was passed as eligible to board the flight. 

The Virgin Atlantic flight was half full so we were spaced apart in a satisfactory manner unlike the jammed full DELTA  flight from SRQ to ATL. I hardly drink alcohol but I needed the bottle of red after sampling the vegetarian chili.  But the service was meticulous and caring which seems to typify Virgin Atlantic flights, I understand. 

The flight was fine especially with my new birthday present noise-cancelling headphones. The problem was that you can see the cabin crew talking but you cannot hear anything that they say until you take off the headphones. But to be free of those low frequency engine sounds makes such a difference. 

All that customer service ceased immediately after our arrival in London Heathrow. As usual, we all sprinted to the Border control only be confronted by a huge queue of hundreds in front of us. Only three people were servicing the queue, and one of them went to lunch while we waited. It took two hours for us to reach the front of the queue.  

One again, I was interrogated and my documents inspected. When the Border control Office reached the date of my pre-flight test, he stopped and turned to me with roughly the same look that I received in Atlanta. But he waved me through and I was back in England after the normal computer recognition comparison with my passport. 

When I finally emerged from the “ARRIVAL” corridor, there was my taxi driver still waiting after over an hour and a half. We did a quick negotiation to pay for the extra wait then we went to his car. 

I had requested a small comfortable car but the taxi company couldn’t really come up with one. I had no luggage so it was a case of “the smaller the better” and “comfortable”. They eventually said that that they would charge me for their cheapest car but send a “nice car”.  

I was completely unprepared for the huge MERCEDES which greeted me in the parking lot. I asked the driver if I could sit in the front seat as the back seat was so far away from him. But this was not to be the case for reasons which I not quite aware – something like COVID-19, insurance, smell of disinfectant . . . . . 

But this huge Mercedes went FAST! I often like to meander through country lanes and backroads but . . . . . NONE OF THAN . . . .main roads all the way. The M25 was not too full of traffic so we were through that in a blurrrrrrr. . . . and I was home before I even knew where we were. 

Finally home! I saw sixteen months of mail sitting in the kitchen. These would take me four days to deal with as I sincerely believed sixteen months before that the COVID-19 would die out if we all followed the guidelines. Unfortunately, as we all know, that did NOT  happen! 

I had organized a grocery delivery for an hour after my arrival. Sure enough it arrived and I was looking at fresh vegetables grown just down the road, fish caught in Cornwall, kippers and porridge from Scotland. Even the “Moroccan Cous Cous” was made in England. I love eating British food when I am in UK and US food when I am in the USA. 

But my ordeal was not yet over. UK Border Control still held my future in their hands. Two of the items delivered on the day I arrived were PCR test kits to be used on day 2 and day 8 after my arrival. So, on day 2, I trudged off to the nearest “Priority Post Box” about a mile away to deliver my sample taken just before I left. 

I’ve always had a “fairly” neat garden but I had difficulty getting stuff to grow. NOW, after doing absolutely NOTHING in the garden for one and a half years, the place looked like a forest! How on earth am I going to deal with that! My intelligent decision was just to “leave it for later”. 

To file my tax return, I need a mobile number to capture the code that HMRC sends before I log in. I had previously contacted EE customer service to see whether they could keep the number for me when I returned from the USA. They explained that not using my phone number for six months could mean the loss of my number. BUT, when I emailed them on the day after my return, they cheerfully offered my old number back. This would mean that I could deal with any security issues by using my mobile number. But, in particular, it meant that the very first aspect of HMRC security could be tackled.

A few days later, after checking all my income, I was ready to file my tax return. I logged on as usual and received my code on my mobile . . .  BUT . . . they wanted more. On what date did I start my credit card . . . .  On what date did I start my mobile phone contract . . . . They asked for my passport number which was easy but I simply didn’t have access to all the other stuff. In desperation, I rang HMRC. There was the usual long wait but eventually a very helpful person came on the line. 

“Just because you have YOUR mobile and you are phoning from YOUR number does NOT mean You are YOU!”, the nice HMRC person explained. I desperately asked for help but there seemed no way to prove my identity. Apparently there are companies which will somehow tell HMRC that you ARE YOU but that sounded worse than the predicament I was already in.  

So I returned to the security questionnaire and attempted to answer more questions until SUDDENLY I was accepted as ME! I wonder whether that nice HMRC person had anything to do with it? 

At last I cold file my tax return and even pay the 2019-2020 tax. 

I had a lot of jobs to do in the house and the garden but only one more to do besides staying in “quarantine” for a few more days.

That was the “day 8” test. I faithfully followed instructions and dropped the sample in the Priority Postbox the other side of Addenbrookes hospital. The area is a Biomedical City full of institutes and hospitals for various diseases. It will also house the World Headquarters of Astrozenica which has combined with Oxford University, the UK government and other ethical medical companies to  produce a world vaccine at no profit. 

Only two more days of quarantine remained after this. Curiously it took THREE days to get the result of my day 8 test. By that time I had ended my quarantine taking my first trip into Cambridge. I noticed that the bus route into town had changed. After reaching the station and passing the Apple headquarters it left the main street and followed a circuitous route to end up by the side of the John Lewis store. I noticed that other routes had also changed to avoid the terrible congestion around the bus station. Cambridge obviously needs a new large enough bus station to deal with the fact that it is now an all-the-year-round important market town, a hub for research and education, and a major tourist destination on every visitor’s “ bucket list”. 

At this time of year, the town is usually very busy with tourists and students. The most obvious groups missing were tourists but generally the town centre was very quiet. 

In the sixteen months I had been away in the USA, the bank had almost lost all their humans. It had only  one customer as I arrived and just two employees. One was greeting  customers and the other was supervising the automatic teller machines. I needed help feeding my cheque into the machine. “You’ve put it in the wrong way” said the supervisor but approved of everything else I did. Bank business done, I had no need to stay as all my needs at home were being delivered.

I noticed our favorite number 7 bus waiting across the road and, making sure I was wearing my two masks jumped on. 

I was back!