The house has sold, the internet has been cut off and all our possessions fit in the back of a car. That was the situation we found ourselves in during the UK’s Covid lockdown. It was a strange feeling to be homeless in these unusual times. Thankfully, our parents had already offered us shelter while we organised our flights.

SAYING GOODBYE

After thoroughly cleaning the oven (which was quite an experience) and saying goodbye to our home for the final time, we drove out to the west coast of Scotland where my parents were ready to host us for a week. Their house became our preparation ground zero. With bags, crates and cardboard boxes being shuffled, we put in long days trying to work out what needed to be in hand luggage, hold luggage or our shipping crate.

A week later, we set off for a 500 miles, overnight drive to say goodbye to Brioni’s family. Having completed the physical packing in Scotland, England was the stage for all the administration tasks we had been putting off. From booking Covid tests through to finding government-approved quarantine accommodation in St Vincent, we spent most of the week sitting around the dining room table, surrounded by laptops, printouts and hard drives.

DEPARTURE DAY

At 6am on the day of our departure, the alarm went off and we pulled ourselves and our bags out to the car. After some tearful goodbyes, we pulled away and drove to London Gatwick. Going through an airport during a pandemic is not something I would recommend. It was eerily quiet at check-in and with travellers from all over the world in the departures lounge, with their own understanding of ‘lockdown rules’, it was often difficult to decide how close is too close.

While you might think there would be fewer people traveling at the moment, BA have reduced their services and so our flight to Barbados was fully booked. No social distancing guidelines would be happening here for the next 9 hours! We seemed to be sitting in amongst one massive family who insisted on playing ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire?’ across the entire cabin and as such we were struggling to cope with the decreasing sobriety and increasing volume. Noise cancelling headphones are a God-send!

BARBADOS

Tired and stiff, we disembarked the plane onto the hot Barbadian tarmac. Strict quarantine rules are in force currently and the military managed the crowed into orderly queues for ‘on the runway’ PCR Covid testing.

We only had about an hour between landing in Barbados and catching our next flight to St Vincent and found the strength in numbers approach to be the best way forward. We had been chatting with someone next to us who was doing the same route so we clubbed together to lobby the military commander for assistance. After explaining our predicament, he eventually agreed to let us jump the queue.

Before we could board our connecting flight, we had to collect our 4 suitcases and then check in again so several prayers and more than a few drops of sweat were shed before our last bag finally appeared and we could run (or awkwardly shuffle with overloaded luggage on our backs) the length of the airport with less than ten minutes to go. Somehow we made it in time and we were boarded onto a twin propeller plane with only 12 other people, all spaced to one person per four seater row.

SO CLOSE BUT YET SO FAR

The Caribbean Airlines flight to St Vincent from Barbados is around 45 minutes long and runs much like a bus service with regular flights between Barbados, St Vincent and Grenada. At around 40 minutes into the flight, the pilot came on the speakers to let us know there was an electrical fault with the aircraft and so they would need to turn around and return to Barbados to get it fixed. So after a few tight turns and sudden drops in altitude, we were back on the familiar runway of Barbados airport. We sat on the plane in emergency lighting for around an hour while they turned systems off and on again before they eventually admitted defeat at the issue and offloaded us into the (now closed for the night) airport. The lights were turned back on as we entered the terminal and awaited our fate.

ST VINCENT

Eventually we were allowed to board a new plane for attempt number two. This time everything went without a hitch and we landed in St Vincent shortly before midnight. We were marched to a sterile interview room where we would be individually questioned on our health and travel plans. The rules around Covid in St Vincent have been changing every day so we weren’t sure if we would be quarantined for one day or two weeks. Understandably, there was more than a little tension in the air (and hopefully that was all that was in the air) as we took our turn to answer the questions being put to us by a PPE-plastered official. White boiler suit, filtered mask, goggles and face visor suggested that Covid is being taken very seriously on the island indeed. And so it should. St Vincent and the Grenadines has had very few cases of Covid-19 during the whole pandemic and their extra efforts to keep it that way put the UK to shame.

QUARANTINE

Free to travel directly to our quarantine location, we collected our bags and made our way to the exit. During our prolonged travel together, our new friend from the plane told us that we was being collected at the airport by someone who may be able to give us a lift. Victor, the taxi driver, turned out to be an old Rastafarian and drove like there was a rally on. I like to think this is because he knows his way around the island like no other but it could have been in an effort to reduce his exposure to these two smelly, tired and possibly Covid-infected tourists. Either way, we found ourselves being welcomed to our hotel room where we would be under house arrest for an unknown period of time. We were not to leave our room for anything and food would be delivered in disposable packaging at set times of day.

Brioni had been told by the airport officials that quarantine had gone up to 14 days, which was concerning given our onward travel plans. I had been told that we would need to quarantine until all 12 passengers on the plane had received clean PCR tests, which would take around 48 hours and we both had been given pieces of official-looking documents that stated 4 days’ quarantine. A little confused, we resigned to our surroundings and settled in with the limited WiFi we had available to us. However, two days later we were informed that the medical officer had cleared us from quarantine and we were free to check out. Excited to breathe fresh air, we packed our things and headed off to find the boat.