djh1959

I will follow along too, it sounds great.

My parents did an Asian river cruise years ago and loved it.

We have been to Thailand quite a few times, but never to Hua Hin.  I didn't realise how cheap getting a driver there would be, we might need to revisit.  Luckily it is an easy trip from Australia.

We stayed at the Krafft Basel.  It is pretty well across river from the Grand Hotel Les Trois Rois, but at about a quarter of the price.

Our room was huge with a large balcony overlooking the Rhine and the old town of Basel.

Service and breakfast were fantastic, all for a quite reasonable price for Switzerland.

It is so strange.  As you probably all know, where I live in Victoria, Australia, we have had the longest and harshest lockdowns in the world.

Now, we are routinely getting 1000-1500 cases per day, and we are fully open, literally no limits to anything.  We can fly in, fly out, go to hotels and dinner, yet we went into lockdown with 8 daily cases.  Strange.

Such a shame for Germany and Austria, I can't see how this is ever going to end.

We stayed in Alsace (Strasbourg) for a week a few months pre-covid.  We loved the area, although it was winter, not summer as it is now.

We also did a private tour visiting Riquewihr and Ribeauville as well as three or four wineries.  It was a great day.  Another day we caught the train to Colmar, yet another very pretty town.  It is a stunning area.

Enjoy your cruise.

We've been to Amsterdam a few times and always stay at Banks Mansion Hotel, which is on the banks of a canal and old fashioned (Art Deco) and lovely.

The Double Tree is definitely more convenient to the station, but bland and boring.  My parents stayed there, so we visited and were very glad we stayed where we did, or in another more interesting hotel.

Trams are easy and taxies are plentiful and not too expensive.

The Delta variant is still spreading here in Australia and now hospital and ICU numbers are also climbing.  There have been five deaths in the last week or so, after none all the way through 2021 til now.

Over half of Australia is now in total lockdown again, this is a never ending spiral it seems.

Singapore did something similar to the UK and removed all of their restrictions.  It lasted for three weeks, and they are now putting most of them back, again due to Delta increasing rapidly.

Great news that you are negative, Coral.

What dreadful news about the flooding.  As I mentioned yesterday, I have heard nothing about it here in Australia - all we get is covid news.  I hope that you are well Notamermaid, and that things improve soon.

We are just ending day one of our lockdown.  I have little faith that it will end in five days, but time will tell.

Here in Melbourne, we are back in lockdown, again!  This is lockdown number five.  So far it is being sold as a "short sharp lockdown to get on top of things".  We've heard all that before, especially before the one that went to four months.

Again it is the Delta variant that has spread down with returning travellers (again) from Sydney and some furniture removalists that travelled here without masks, drove all over the state and into South Australia and now refuse to tell the contract tracers where they have been.  The mind simply boggles at these imbeciles.

We have 18 cases over two day, not many I know, but it certainly seems to be spreading rapidly, both at outdoor football matches and in supermarkets.  Even more worryingly a few of the people are fully vaccinated, yet still easily catching and spreading it.  Of course, we have no idea how sick they are yet, just that they are positive.

Hopefully things pick up in Germany Notamermaid, I must say that I have heard or read nothing of floods here, I will have to look out for new on that.

Luckily we here in Victoria are doing well and have now had ten days of zero new cases.

Unfortunately, in Sydney, in New South Wales, things are not so good.  The Delta variant is causing chaos there and case numbers are creeping up daily.  They are now all in lockdown, but so far it is not helping.

I really don't know how we will get rid of this.

Here in Australia, most of our states are in lockdown.  For once, my state, Victoria, is not.

I am finding it fairly ridiculous, as the number of cases is quite low compared to the rest of the world.  We only have one person in hospital, but every new case is the Delta variant, which is appearing to spread far, far quicker than what we had before.

There are calls to stop incoming flights, which I agree with, because we have a very low vaccination rate here.  I think only 25% of Australians have had one shot and less than 5% have had two, primarily becaause we had so much trouble getting Astra Zenica supplies from Europe, and now Pfizer from the US.

From what we are told, this should start to improve rapidly as we are now manufacturing Astra Zenica and have been promised much greater supply of Pfizer and Moderna later in the year.  However, Europe promised AZ too, then reneged on the deal.

This seems to be an endless situation, made much harder by seeing how much freedom there is in the northern hemisphere.

I still can't help but think that people should not be travelling to different countries just yet, it is simply too soon.

Whether you are vaccinated or not, you can still catch the virus, particularly the newer variants, and pass it on to non-vaccinated people.

As you probably know, things have been good in Australia, but now it is starting to flare up again, all caused by people flying in from other countries and bringing the Delta variant with them.

Here in Melbourne, our lockdown is over, for now.  Sydney is in a mess getting quite a few cases per day, and there are now cases in Queensland, Northern Territory and Western Australia.  WA hasn't had cases for many months, but this Delta variant appears to be a much more difficult beast to control.

I cannot wait to travel again, but like notamermaid stated, I fear it will be 2023.  Hopefully that is wrong, but I can't see enjoyable, relaxed travel before late 2022.  By that I mean no masks and no constant fear of lockdowns and sudden quarantine.

I second the suggestion to visit Pont du Gard.  Definitely one of the most memorable sites that I have seen in Europe.

We stayed four days in Avignon itself and loved it.  Aix was nice, but a bit too small for my liking to stay in.

We had a Junior Balcony Suite on Scenic Pearl in late 2019.  There are four on the Diamond deck, the first two had a slight obstruction, but ours did not.

The cabin was really quite nice and there are a few extras for Diamond deck.

I loved the position of the cabin, it was so easy to pop back for a jacket or to use the bathroom.  We didn't hear any noise from the lounge area, so convenience without nuisance.

The dinner at Table La Rive was fantastic.  One of the other perks was canapes each evening, which we thought that we would love.  It turned out though that these canapes were merely finger sandwiches and absolutely nothing special.  The worst was that you had to order them 24 hours in advance - we never knew if we would be hungry or not, so didn't bother.

We had two butlers, one was terrific, the other was not.

I doubt we would cruise with Scenic again, but if we did I think I would save money and try the Sapphire deck.

Enjoy your cruise.

We certainly didn't have a Royal Suite, but a Junior Suite on Scenic, which had a butler.

One butler that served us was terrific, the other one not so much unfortunately.

There were some very disappointing things though with the extra "perks".  We were told that we got pre-dinner nibbles each day but nothing happened.  After two days, I enquired and was told that we had to pre-order each day with 24 hours notice!  How on earth would we know if were were going to be hungry enough the next day?  We weren't even sure if we would be back from our excursions in time.

We also had room service available, but in a junior suite, there was nowhere to eat except for the balcony.  One would hope a royal suite would be considerably better than that.

Overall I would never get a suite with Scenic again as the service did not match the expense.

As for wine, we found that there were some good ones, but you had to persist and ask for them otherwise only the very average house wines were served.

My husband and I finally got our first dose of the vaccine last night.  We had no choice but to get Astra Zenica as Pfizer is saved for younger people.  I am slightly edgy about clots, but I do know that that is quite ridiculous, and I have more chance of being run over.  Pfizer apparently has some extreme side effects too, plus the fact that there is none available.
We are booked in for our second shots in twelve weeks to the day.
Only two new cases today, all linked and all isolated, so we are praying to get out of full lockdown later in the week.
We have already been told though that there will be no travelling around the state, or visiting in private homes.  Visiting is the thing I am missing the most 😞
Time will tell what happens, but it seems to be coming under control once more, thank goodness.

9 hours ago, notamermaid said:

 

 

@djh1959 Do you have to wear masks indoors when you do not have any confirmed cases? Do you have to now?

 

notamermaid

 

 

Up until two weeks ago, we had no mask rules at all.  Since the latest "outbreak" and lockdown number 4, masks are now mandatory everywhere except in your own home.  I do abide by this, except when out walking by myself, as I find the need for a mask out on a track a little ridiculous.
Indoor mask rules don't apply when eating or drinking or if you have an exemption.  We must have a lot of people with exemptions, often all in the one family it seems.
Lots of people walk around with an empty coffee cup or water bottle to get around it.
Bear in mind we have a total of 60 cases, all in isolation.
Unfortunately they are all the Indian variant, and it seems both the kappa and delta strains.
Time will tell how we go, but it is only convincing me that we cannot and should not travel country to country just yet.

Daisi, you will certainly enjoy your stay at home restrictions being lifted.

We have been lucky since the end of February, when life pretty much got back to normal here.  We have been able to have visitors, dine inside, all shops open and able to travel interstate.  International travel is still strictly forbidden, except for the chosen few - the very rich, film stars, sports people lol.

Now, we are back in Stage 3 lockdown, no visitors, only essential food and medical shopping and can only leave our house for 2 hours for shopping or exercise.  Last week we could only travel 5km, but they have generously extended that to 10km this week.  It makes no difference though, as everything is closed.

It is super hard to take after being in full lockdown for over four months last year, and half lockdown until well after Christmas.

We are hoping that it might end next Thursday, but they have already stated that we won't be allowed visitors for many weeks.  All this for 50 cases seems somewhat disproportionate but it is what it is.

Notamermaid, that is wonderful news for you.

Unfortunately, here in Melbourne, our lockdown has been extended for yet another week.  What was supposed to be a "circuitbreaker" will now be a minimum of a fortnight of total lockdown, which is incredibly depressing after what we had last year.

Now we need to wait another week and see if they will let us out to play.

Things actually seem to be going quite well, case numbers are not escalating very badly, ie. today there were three new cases only.

It seems a disproportionate response to have us totally locked down for only 50 cases in the entire state, but it is what it is.  Our health boffins are very scared by the "Indian" variant, which of course they let in by allowing flights from India.

Best wishes for a speedy recovery.  Holiday planning will certainly help you along.

18 hours ago, Daisi said:

I think the main thing is, we have both Federal and Provincial Governments making the rules and no enforcement.  There was an American traveller last summer who was supposed to drive directly through from Alaska to the US, however he decided to stop in and tour around Banff Alberta.  They finally caught him, charged him (possibly jail sentence and most likely a large fine) however in December, they quietly dropped all punishments, so I'm interested to see how things go this year.

We have a similar situation with both state and federal governments involved, and in the case of my state, Victoria, the state government is Labour and the federal is Liberal, so there are lots of politics at play, and each blames the other.

Things would be a lot better if the feds ran everything, but the states don't like that.

We have the same situation with punishments, there have been thousands of fines dished out and to my knowledge, no-one pays them and nothing is done.  

No point making rules and not enforcing them.

18 hours ago, Daisi said:

I think that is our problem, the Government is bringing in the rules, but no one is enforcing them, so people still go out and have parties, leave quarantine because they don't like it, or even refuse to go. 

There is no way anyone can leave quarantine here.  It is all hotel quarantine, paid for by the returning passenger in full, and they are guarded either by security or by police.

Home quarantine is not allowed, hopefully once we get the vaccination numbers up, it might be allowed for vaccinated people.

23 hours ago, notamermaid said:

At this point I am wondering if we you should all stay within our country for the next two years. Why are you even allowing a plane from India to land??

 

I don't know, but is there something wrong with the tests or the hotels? Read this story of a person getting Covid-19 because the family on the other side of the corridor opened their door so he got a full waft.

 

 

Notamermaid, what you read is correct.  The planes that are landing are full of Australian citizens returning from India.  A bigger question is why they were allowed to go there during a pandemic, when our borders are supposedly closed.  Some people can get special permission to leave, and it seems a lot went to India.  The gentleman in question was allowed to go for a family wedding, which seems highly unfair as during our lockdown last year, no-one could attend any wedding in a different state as the borders were shut.  There were no weddings allowed in Victoria.

He flew to Adelaide and went into quarantine there, was tested four times, all negative.  He was released then flew home to Melbourne, felt sick a few days later, got tested and was positive.  I believe this is the second or third time that this has happened.  The assumption is that he picked up the virus when he opened his room door shortly after a positive case next door opened his (or hers).

By the time he was discovered to be positive, it was too late, it has spread everywhere, I think we are at 39 cases now.  I realise that this is not a big number by European or US standards, but it is huge when we have been covid free for months.

Today there were only four new cases, but the contacts that they are checking have grown to 15,000 and there are many exposure sites, so the "experts" are expecting the numbers to grow rapidly.

Things have got considerably worse here in Melbourne.  Our case numbers doubled overnight, and are now spread all over the city.  Authorities are saying that they are all the Indian variant and that it appears that it spreads six times faster than the original.  Not sure if this is true or not, but this is moving like wildfire.
Sadly, we have a flight with 150 people from India that landed here this afternoon.  They will of course all go into quarantine but there are now more and more cases where people have tested negative after fourteen days and then get sick a couple of days later.  That is the entire reason for our new outbreak.
From midnight tonight we are back in total lockdown.  Work from home, cannot drive further than 5km, and only to buy food, medical care or get vaccinated.  No visitors and all other business closed.  We can buy take away and booze, thank god.
After being covid free for months, this is devastating to people here.
I would be very wary of travel out of your country, you never know if you will run into someone at an airport who has been to a country with this variant.  It appears to need to be avoided at all costs.

Our cluster is still growing, currently our state government is in a cabinet meeting to decide whether to put us back into lockdown :(.

They are also awaiting test results of another person who has returned from overseas, done the mandatory 14 days quarantine, tested negative, but then after release, later becoming ill.  This is how this latest cluster started, and if this second passenger is also positive, maybe quarantine needs to be longer than 14 days.

This Indian variant is proving to be a very big problem.  It was announced on talk back radio just before that the UK variant was twice as transmissible as the original, but the Indian variant is five times worse again!  Now that is scary.

21 hours ago, Canal archive said:

In London we now have Vaxi-Taxi’s black cabs that will take anyone who is vulnerable or cannot for any reason get to a vaccination place for free. Over 60 million jabs given and nearly 23 million second jabs. We’re getting there and the more of us who get vaccinated the bigger step it will be towards herd immunity. Fingers crossed as I do want to get to France this year. CA

 

djh1959, when the experts look into these instances there will be a reason and hopefully lessons will be learnt, faster that our lot with the so called Indian variant, fingers crossed. 

Did you see the Indian government has banned the use of the expression ‘Indian Variant’ on social media. 

What a terrific idea with the free taxis.  The UK has done so well with vaccinations, we have only vaccinated around 3-4 million, which is pathetic.  

A lot of people do not want vaccinations though, as we had no covid here and they thought the vaccine risk was higher than the covid risk.  Outbreaks like we are currently getting will hopefully change the views of some of these fools.

There are now 9 cases, we are only allowed 5 visitors and masks everywhere indoors.  Yuk, we have been normal for three for four months, and it will be really tough with this backwards step.  What we all hope though, is that it doesn't end up in another lockdown - today is the first anniversary of what ended up being the longest lockdown in the Western world.

As for the Indian government, all governments have objected to the names of variants, with the exception of the UK.  But of course they are not allowed to object are they?

As for the golf tournament, it is nuts isn't it.  Everyone seems to think this is almost over, but as we are showing, it isn't, it is just dormant for a while.  Unfortunately, this will continue while travel continues.  That is the only way it got back in here.