Travel plans - meet COVID 19
Here's the gist of EVERYTHING we did once we figured our trip to Scotland had to be pushed forward indefinitely!
There's no drama here. I'll tell you right now that the whole trip (planned for mid-April 2020) stands cancelled. So here goes.
Stay
Photo by John Tekeridis from Pexels
We were crazy excited about the trip and all the places we'd booked via Airbnb. The place at the Isle of Skye had stunning views and the one in Edinburgh was cosy and in the heart of the city! Unfortunately, there came a time when even after wishing for the best we realized that the trip would not happen on the dates we had scheduled.
We spoke to the hosts and some of them readily agreed to postpone the dates. But we kept wondering what dates to postpone it to. Would September 2020 be a good time? Or was it better to travel only in 2021? A whole year without travel seemed tough. By the third week of March though, Airbnb cancelled all bookings and - we got our refund. That was our first sigh of relief.
Local Travel
Photo by Avinash Patel from Pexels
I was looking forward to the road trip from Edinburgh to the Isle of Skye via Loch Ness; waiting to explore everything along the way. We'd booked an automatic (car) for which the payment had to be made a few days before the trip. So thankfully there was nothing much to be done here except to verify that we had indeed cancelled this booking.
We also had a flight booked from Inverness to London for the last leg of the trip which also stands cancelled.
This was relief #2.
Sightseeing
Photo by Anna Urlapova from Pexels
We hadn't really gotten around to getting tickets to any of the tourist spots. So thankfully, I don't have to wake up from dreams of elegant spots we were supposed to have been. Phew! Relief #3
Flights!!!
Flight tickets were the largest chunk of our travel expenses. And this is something we're still waiting to hear from the travel company Cleartrip.com.
Photo by Stefan Stefancik from Pexels
Here's the deal.
We used a whole bunch of reward points on our credit card to book seats on a certain airline through a travel website. The airline has naturally asked us to check with the travel website for travel vouchers or a refund. However, the headquarters and the customer care number of the travel website are not accessible. Our booking 'surprise, surprise', does not reflect on the travel website.
So, we're in a bit of a pickle.
We're hoping to hear from the powers that be soon and things get resolved.
Until then, I'm taking deep breaths and keeping busy.
Toodles.
Update: We did get the refund for the flights as well thanks to a colleague who had contacts at Cleartrip. Hurrah for that. And I do hope that we can plan this trip someday. But what's most important right now is for us all to be safe, healthy, and happy. Travel will happen when it happens.
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