Looking back at 2021 from a Travel Perspective

2021 was another difficult year in the pandemic. I remember watching the muted New Years celebrations as 2020 came to an end thinking with vaccines coming this terrible time will come to an end and things will get back to normal. I was hoping that people would no longer have to deal with the illness and worse. While things are better than they were in 2020, 2021 has not been easy especially for the many hit hard by the pandemic. We have been blessed this year by not being adversely effected by Covid-19. Before I get into 2021 from a travel perspective I want to wish the best to all those who have had love ones get severely ill or lost someone this year. While things are dark now at some point there will be a beautiful sunrise where things will be better again.

2021 in Travel

For us 2021 was another year of travel difficulty but we were able to do much more than in 2021. In 2020 thinking that things would be blown over by October of 2021 we booked a Scandinavian cruise. We also booked trips to The Bahamas, Alaska, Puerto Rico, Costa Rica and many other places for 2021. Many of our plans did not go through due to pandemic and the many challenges this year. All our October international plans were canceled by the tour companies (Scandinavia, British Isles and Croatia). Puerto Rico got canceled by us due to a possible Hurricane approaching Houston. Our August Alaska Plans were also canceled due to Hurricanes in the Gulf but we were able to move them to October. We canceled our Bahamas trip due to the heavy restrictions in Nassau that included all museums being closed. The most last minute cancelation this year was our Christmas Markets Tour of Europe that was in place of our trip in October. European countries started locking down and our trip was canceled. We wanted to still go on an international trip so we quickly booked a wonderful Caribbean cruise in its place.

This year taught us a lot about flexibility and being prepared for anything that might come. We have always bought travel insurance for international trips but started buying travel insurance for domestic trips as well due to how many obstacles we ran into. The pandemic did cause a lot of issues but its not the only challenge to travel in 2021.

Wild Weather

In the beginning of the year we had a temporary companion pass so we got buy one get one free airfare with Southwest. We booked quite a few flights for January and February to take advantage of low costs for flights and hotels. Our first major travel challenge occurred in February. We took a weekend trip to Phoenix and really enjoyed things like the Musical Instrument Museum. We made several flight changes to get home earlier due to the approaching winter storm in Texas. Our flight got canceled and when the runways at Hobby became frozen over we became stranded in Phoenix for several days. We stayed in our hotel worrying if our house and cats were ok. After multiple flight cancelations and a wild experience at the airport where within 9 minutes we had a flight canceled, were rebooked by some great gate agents and a frantic airport cart ride to another flight we were able to get back home. Flying back into Houston was like flying into a war zone. Hobby was in rough shape and the parking garage had no power and was iced over when driving out. This was the most dramatic weather issue we had in the year but it was not the last. We dealt with strong Hurricanes, Thunderstorms that canceled flights and stranded us in places like Austin, and we even traveled to the desert in El Paso only to face flash floods. We postponed a trip to Reno/Tahoe due to terrible wild fires. We flew into Chicago from Maine through the worst weather I have ever flown through. sheets of rain, lightning, and strong winds and turbulence. People around the country told us how strange the weather had been in their area. I can only hope that next year some of this wild weather will calm down. This all taught us that we have to watch the weather and we now are much more cautious when it comes to leaving on a trip with possible bad weather.

The Good

While there were many challenges this year we also got back to traveling in a major way in 2021. We traveled over 57,000 miles, visited 21 states, a US territory and 5 different countries this year. The 57,000 miles is a record for us in one year. We added multiple new states such as Idaho and Alaska to our travels. We added several new countries such as Costa Rica, Dominican Republic and The British Virgin Islands. We visited pretty much every type of environment you can imagine from deserts, tropical rainforest, mountains, artic regions such as Alaska and everywhere in between. We stood in mountain passes, in front of towering sand dunes, in a cloud rainforest and in swamps. We visited each region in the US (West, Midwest, Northeast, South). We met some many great people and learned so much about the different people and cultures around the United States. We also had the chance to have great conversation with people around the world. In Costa Rica we got to know the hotel staff and our tour guides well. We shared information about the US and they shared with us about Costa Rica. We also saw the impact travel has on developing countries especially during our cruise. For example our guide in the Dominican Republic said due to the loss of travel they were experiencing 45% unemployment. Our taxi driver there said he had not worked in a year and a half. Everyone in that country was excited to have cruising back so they could get good paying jobs. Travel not only benefits us in our learning but we can also give back to the communities we visit with vital income. As mentioned above we got back to cruising with our first cruise since January of 2020. We found it safe despite what might be mentioned by the media as they are taking many precautions such as fully vaccinated guests and crew, and testing before you get on the ship. We were able to travel with my parents multiple times and my mother in law on several occasions this year. We had a truly great travel year despite all of the major challenges we encountered. If you are flexible and patient you can get through whatever is thrown at you and have a great time.

What I’m looking forward to in 2022

In 2022 like everyone else I am looking forward to an end of the madness this pandemic has been and a hope for the end to many of the travel restrictions that are out there. Unfortunately many of the restrictions do not seem to work as the virus still spreads around the world and you can catch it pretty much anywhere. I hope to be able to travel back to Europe (our favorite place on Earth) again without any issues and possibly travel to places in Central America, South America, the Caribbean and the Middle East if everything works out. I hope to be able to continue to travel with family and friends as we did last year so we can discover or re-discover places with them. Beyond travel I really hope in our country we can find a way to make things easier and healthier for people. Violence and frustration is growing it seems in our country so we have to find ways to come together and fix things here.

In Conclusion

2021 was a challenging year but one that was good ultimately travel wise for us. We were able to see so many different places and environments throughout the year. We were able to meet many people and learn from them all over the country and internationally. We finally got back to some international travel and I look forward to more.

For 2022, I want to wish everyone a truly blessed year and I hope that we can finally put this terrible pandemic behind us and move on to greater things on the other side. Have a happy and safe New Years everyone!