On October 30, 2021, it's hard to believe that this is the first new post on this travel blog since December 17, 2019. We had several trips planned for 2020, but then the world shut down.
We've been itching to travel ever since. We've done a few domestic trips. . .California, Arizona, St. John in the USVI, Nashville, and most recently Austin. . .but now we are in Portugal as our first foreign trip since the Christmas markets of 2019. We crushed travel in 2019 -- a month in Barcelona, three weeks in Hong Kong/China, a week in the USVI, a week in Big Sur, the Christmas markets, so the fond memories of 2019 helped sustain us in 2020.
But enough about 2019, enough about COVID stopping us from traveling. A lot of other people had bigger problems and challenges caused by COVID. We are joyous to be back doing international travel.
We've never been to Portugal, so it seemed like a great place to go. Our first day, yesterday, was fantastic, even though the sky was either overcast or rainy. The sun was out briefly in the morning, but the rain came with a vengeance from mid-afternoon on.
Traveling to Portugal was relatively easy. We both got negative tests. . .between two vaccines in the spring, the booster within the last three months, and very mild breakthrough cases for each of us in August, we are as well-equipped to deal with COVID as a couple possibly could be.
We only had to show the negative test once, while checking in at Dulles. The flight attendants did not enforce the "must wear a mask when not eating/drinking rule," and our flight actually landed at 5:00 am, 55 minutes early, so we had the airport to ourselves, breezing through immigration and grabbing our bags.
It's nice to be in a foreign country again.
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