Well by the time you read this, severe and drastic measures are probably in place confining you to stay at home and work has shut down for 30 days. We were due to fly home today, but Virgin has now stopped all flights to and from the UK, so we won’t be going back as planned.
We have mixed feelings about all this, we understand the possible severity of the situation, but at the same time can’t help thinking that we may be suffering from a Y2K situation (all the computers in the world were going to stop on the stroke of midnight on new years eve 1999). Because of the unknown and uncertainty of what is actually going to happen, people seem to wildly speculate and things seem to escalate to a fever pitch very quickly, we had a similar level of panic over “chicken flu” and “SARS”.
We also surmise there’s such a blame culture now that people, businesses and politicians are frightened about what they do for fear of making a mistake?
On the other hand, because nobody knows, we understand the need to be cautious and try and protect the most vulnerable.
So now we are in the US until our insurance runs out – we only get 89 days at a time – so let’s hope things change before then. Many friends who are cruising in the islands are stuck or even being politely asked to leave isolated moorings and go to the main islands. All islands seem to have closed to new arrivals and even East Coast US marinas are starting to say they won’t take “transients” as we are called over here. We are very lucky to have a mooring at the end of our friend’s garden where we can hunker down and see how things pan out.
All shopping malls are like ghost towns, bars, restaurants etc are closed here, as are most businesses. The beaches, boardwalks and parks are also closed, but we are going to venture out and try and find somewhere to stretch our legs so we don’t completely atrophy.. more to follow…..