Well, I should be home later today 1.12.21. But, I won’t be. My African experience has been extended, in the most interesting of ways! You see, if you’ve been following the news, South Africa discovered a new variant of Covid. In exchange for being open with the World about this new variant, other countries rewarded South Africa by attempting to seal it off (slight overexaggeration) from the rest of the World. This is my story.
(TLDR: I’m fine. Everything is fine.)
After leaving Zambia, I headed into Botswana. In Botswana I had 0 cell or wifi service. Because, by design, I was in the middle of nowhere. It was glorious. (As I now have extra time, watch for posts about tracking a cheetah on a hunt, tracking (and watching) a successful pack of Painted Dogs hunt, and multiple Lions, and a ton of Elephants.)
So, fast forward to November 27th. I land in Johannesburg, to a flurry of worried messages (mostly from my mom. hi mom, I’m fine!). And, most importantly, a message from Qatar that all flights from South Africa were being cancelled effective immediately. There would be no help rebooking on other airlines. There would be no assistance finding a hotel. There would be no Qatar staff on the ground available to help. I was on my own.
I immediately swung into action. I’ve spent 21 years traveling internationally, and although this was certainly the most worrisome situation I’ve experienced, I knew what to do. First, I knew that tens of thousands of people would be in a similar situation (only Air Seychelles, Swiss, United, Delta, Lufthansa, Kenya, Ethiopian and South African Airways had not cancelled their flights – which at most ran once daily – some of which only ran a few times a week). I had to move quick.
As soon as I was off the plane, I immediately started looking at my options. Although there were a couple options for sale for connections through Europe, I avoided those. First, I didn’t know if the cancellations would continue. Second, I assumed (rightly as it turned out with the exception of Swiss), that when the European airlines did resume they would only repatriate Europeans and would not transport transit passengers.
Although an extension of my vacation in the Seychelles was tempting, I was worried that the Seychelles was going to be added to ban lists and the cost of quarantining there would be prohibitive. So that left me with African options. And, it worked. I fly later this week to another country in Africa where I pick up a flight to the USA.
Flights sorted, I had to find a hotel. I immediately called the hotel to which I was already to spend two nights in Joburg, they were able to accomodate me staying, at my original rate, for as long as I needed.
Now, everything was sorted before I got my duffel and made it through customs. Phew. And thank goodness. The Johannesburg airport was like a war zone. Thousands upon thousands of panicked passengers clogged the halls. Queues for ticketing were horribly long, snaking through passageways and intersecting with queues for other airlines. I went in search of Qatar to find there were only 2 contract employees to help thousands (Qatar had 3 flights a day from JNB) – and indeed when I later reached Qatar by email/phone they offered 0 assistance and only a refund of the unused portion of my ticket – when the last minute one-way replacements I had to purchase were far more expensive than the refund they offered. I didn’t bother to join the queue to speak to the two agents and instead took a cab to my hotel.
(I’ll deal with my travel insurance and Qatar when I get home to see what it anything is covered.)
In the end, I am extremely lucky. It is 1.12 here and it is still reported there are still thousands of stranded passengers in JNB, some sleeping at the airport. I have a hotel room in a good part of town. I am healthy. I have the means and knowledge of the travel industry to take care of myself. I will make it back to the US (negative Covid test willing). There are so many here that are not so lucky.
What a way to end the trip. Yet another memory from this trip that I will never forget. More to come.
The Kahn Man 