Oh, yes … we can get away to the sun without sacrificing a goat and 3 chickens! More to the point, without taking ANY tests on the way as we’re fully vaccinated and boosted. Sorry, Mr. Djokovic!
In November 2021 we invested, speculatively, a £350 deposit on a BA Holidays trip to the Dominican Republic with the understanding that a further £6300 would be payable in December if everything hadn’t been cancelled by then. We’ve lost 7 holidays since Covid made it’s unwelcome appearance, and although we managed to get to Antigua in August last year we still have a degree of nervousness about “will it actually happen?”
So it’s Club Europe/Club World flights [of course], JER-LHR/LGW-PUJ and a week’s really nice and civilised All-Inclusive at Zoetry Agua again.
https://www.amrcollection.com/en/res...ua-punta-cana/ Yes, that’s right … we were there 2 years ago for our 40th Wedding Anniversary (
https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip...-oh-there.html) We wanted to return and of course then had our Feb 2021 booking for our 41st cancelled!! Annoyingly, that trip was noticeably cheaper than this one, but at least we’re getting away. And this BA Holiday qualifies for double tier points, so BAEC Gold renewal is assured [who needs Status extensions?!]. And then we have to ensure how we actually do that, with the ever-changing Covid regulations everywhere - but the plan seemed pretty straightforward. We just need to jump though a few hoops!
Jersey. A painless Exit and Entry process for fully-vaxxed residents. Our Social Security numbers cover everything: all we need is to submit an on-line Travel Form on the way home.
UK. Ahh, a bit more complicated to research on gov.uk, as BA takes us to LHR but then the long-haul goes from LGW. However, entry from the “Common Travel Area” (Channel Islands, Isle of Man and Ireland) was uncomplicated, and no testing was required as we were doing a ‘landslide transit and departing within 24 hours’ … once you have found the relevant sub-paragraph in the rules. Returning from the DR was slightly more complicated, requiring the submission of a Passenger Locator Form (PLF) before travel … but still no Test requirement for us.
Dominican Republic. ĦOle! The DR have implemented an extremely sensible and practical on-line “E-ticket” arrangement, which generates a QR Code that covers the passenger for Immigration, Customs and Health declarations! For both passengers … and up to 7, IIRC! And, to our amazement, no testing requirement if fully vaccinated … just a declaration of “No Symptoms” … how brave!
https://viajerodigital.mitur.gob.do/english/
So, all we needed to do was prepare a list of
when the various bits needed to be submitted to whoever (mainly T-48) and ensure we had copies of any certificates etc available. At this point I have to admit to being an old dinosaur … no, I do not have a smart-phone! I have a cheap PAYG stupid-phone, and an iPad when travelling. So, in addition to carrying various certificates, I also scanned everything and saved all those images in a folder in the iPad’s Photo Library. That should do … we hoped!
Christmas came and went, the balance was paid to BA, and we started to feel this was really going to happen. And finally, with suitcase packed and OLCI achieved for all the outbound sectors (and paper BPs printed, of course) we were good to go!
That’s enough preamble … let’s go on a journey to somewhere WARM!
