Category: Travel

A Trip to England: Covid Risks and Responsibilities

In November I’ll travel to England, my first overseas trip in over 1½ years. This will be the first time I’ve flown eastbound across the Atlantic on a daytime flight. But, enough of firsts. The trip isn’t assured. It’s possible Covid travel restrictions to the UK could be tightened and I would have to cancel… Continue reading A Trip to England: Covid Risks and Responsibilities

Closed Border

Air New Zealand cancelled our December HNL/AKL flights: it looks like the country won’t reopen to tourists until 2022. So, today, I cancelled a bunch of hotel reservations: we’re $0 out of pocket. We’ve saved over the years by buying only medical coverage

Ready for Quick Getaway

Prepared for an early flight tomorrow morning to Chicago. I’ll explore on foot and shared bicycles (hence the helmet) then fly back in the evening.

A Request from Her Majesty

I now have Her Britannic Majesty watching my back: my British passport arrived today. I’ll usually travel on my US passport, but a second passport might help me to work around nationality-dependent Covid restrictions.

Backup Passport

Spent much of the afternoon applying for a UK passport: my old one expired 15 years ago. Post-Covid travel with 2 passports may give more flexibility: when I arrive at London LHR later this year, I’ll choose the shortest immigration line. (Current wait times are up to 7 hours.)

Age Surcharge

Came upon this when renting a car for a trip to New Zealand later this year when I’ll be 70. Felt indignant until I realized it says “*above* 70.” Now it feels like a repriev

Cut and Cover

Cycled rail trails. At one point a trench was being cut to house a tunnel for the Green Line LRT extension. Once the trench is covered, this area will revert to parkland and trails.

$2,000 Refund

Realized a $2,000+ airline refund from the early days of Covid was still pending after 10 months. It took 90 minutes to resolve this issue in our favor via text with Delta, but the service was excellent, and I have a written record of the discussion.

Globetrotter Martha

Google Photos’ People-and-Pets search feature makes it easy to click a face and go directly to photographs of that person. Here’s an example from our photo collection: Can you spot the odd person out? Yup? I’ll call her Martha. Of course, I clicked Martha’s face, and up came about 20 photographs. I’ve written about Martha… Continue reading Globetrotter Martha