Getting caught up, I'm a few pages behind....
Feel bad for international travelers. What a roller coaster they’re going through
As an “international” guest (in quotes because I feel like people think overseas not Canada when talking international), I can tell you most of us do not feel like we’re on a roller coaster ride in terms of waiting for travel rules to let up. I haven’t seen super recent polling, but the last number I saw was I believe close to 80 percent want the borders to remain how they are and the quarantines and whatnot to stay in place.
Here in Canada at least in my province people are much more focused on the roller coaster of local restrictions (we can be fined for having people over from outside our household, and even giants like Walmart can only sell essential items in store), people miss travel, and you will always have those who push boundaries and don’t care about Covid who are willing to go now, but the majority are not eager for it to open back up. That seems much more like a US thing right now.
Sorry I meant travel within the US by Americans as the US thing I was referring to. Up here we are being urged to stay in our own provinces at this point, with quarantines in some places if you are entering from another. The biggest group of Canadians traveling seems to be the politicians
.
On travel centered forums like this there has been an idea perpetuated that many outside the US are eagerly anticipating the day when we are no longer restricted (actually restricted or effectively restricted with inconvenient policies), the post I responded to specifically mentioned international guests being on a roller coaster due to restrictions put in place by our own countries. Very different concerns right now up here, most are not bothered by restricted travel even within the country.
To speak a bit on this... as an "International" traveler (another Canadian), with my own perspective...
Do I feel it's a roller coaster? Yes. Though not solely due to the travel issues, but they are definitely part of it. I
am anxiously waiting the day that we can travel again. We're one of the "border town" people - as the crow flies our house is 1 mile from the US border. We spent time in Maine almost every week - getting my mail, grocery shopping, getting gas, golfing, skiing, our orthodontist is over there. The shut down had a very big impact on our lives - from having to find a new orthodontist, which was really sad since he was my orthodontist growing up, so he has basically been "in my life" for 25 years; to having a financial impact - as a homeschooler, we always shipped our curriculum stateside since it was a fraction of the cost of trying to buy in/ship to Canada, and also, our daughter's medications were far cheaper in the US than Canada, and some aren't even available in Canada, so we had to try and find replacements, and gluten free products were much more plentiful and affordable so we bought a lot of groceries over across; to just having an impact on our general life in the loss of family recreation etc... Both the golf course and ski hill we used were in Maine. They were 15 minutes from our house. The closest ski hill now is almost 1.5 hours away. What's more they were insanely affordable - both places charge a fraction of what our Canadian counterparts do. They were the difference between us being able to afford to go and not being able to. And yes, vacation - we love traveling state-side, and would travel to New Hampshire almost every summer (and Disney every 3-4 years it seems, lol). It truly feels like home to us, and is a special place for our family. Why not travel in Canada? Because it costs too bloody much to travel outside of our local Atlantic Canada (which we already have traveled/continue to travel extensively). I mean, quite literally, we can go to Florida/Disney cheaper than we can fly to Alberta for a week's vacation in our own country. It's sad, honestly. Anyways, the shutdown cost us all of that. So... every Canadian feels differently about the shutdown, and has been impacted in different ways - some weren't impacted at all, and many Canadians could care less if they ever step foot on American soil. We're
not one of them. Heck, we're the ones who want to become snowbirds some day, LOL.
But, all of that said - I still support the shutdown and feel it's absolutely the right move. Unfortunately, things are just way too out of control in the US and it's too big of a risk. But, just because you know it's the right thing, doesn't make it easy.
Ah 2019.. back when we were naive about what was to come. Feels like a decade ago.
I knew from the day I first heard about Covid in China.... what was that, in December 2019... that it was going to come to North America and impact us. But I was thinking it would be like SARS - not
that big of a deal. It would impact the big city areas, but not
everywhere. At that point I never imagined it would be like this. However, by the time February rolled around and it was spreading globally (course now we know it was spreading well before that), and China was in full lockdown... I was stunned by the amount of people who were in absolute denial and couldn't see the writing on the wall.
I also pressed a bit on the "benefits" of staying at a Disney Resort hotel without DME and EMH (and FP+). I think this might have been mentioned here, but the way to look at "Resort Guest Early Entry" (yes, that's the official magical name of this new perk) is not from the perspective of a Disney Resort Guest but rather from the perspective of an offsite Guest who now will never be able to avoid a park with EMH. Every day of an offsite Guest's vacation, they'll be 30 minutes behind Resort Guests. Especially with high-demand attractions like SDD or FoP, that means there's no way they can feasibly "rope drop" those rides to avoid waiting in a long line. In a way, it's more of penalty for offsite Guests than a perk for onsite Guests.
It is absolutely a penalty for off-site guests. We have special needs/health issues kids. Yes, we have
DAS, but DAS on it's own isn't as big of a help as people might think. To make Disney "doable" for our family, it involves combining DAS with other strategies such as rope dropping to take advantage of the low crowds AND FP+. So to lose that rope drop strategy is definitely a kick in the gut, and as much as I hate to say it, will absolutely make us consider whether we'll be able to stay off-site or not. If FP+ comes back, then I can see us still staying off-site. But if it doesn't (or comes back as a paid option), this will basically force us to stay on-site. Or... it will just force us not to return. The next 6 months of news will probably make the decision for us.