It's really not very complicated: Until and unless the panic porn crap stops, on a decisive basis for several years, do not cross national boundaries. You can get stuck there with no reasonable way forward or out that does not involve utterly ridiculous expenditure.
Generally-speaking traveling internationally, no matter the mode (e.g. including cruises) involves non-refundable expenses that you put up on a forward basis, whether it be airline tickets, hotel reservations, cruise reservations and event tickets of various sorts. There has always been risk in this; you might break your leg, get seriously ill and not be able to travel, etc.
But Covid-19 has turned this into a minefield, with utterly no way to predict when you're going to get screwed out of your money at the demand of tin-pot jackwads like Fauci, Biden or their international equivalents with no warning or reason, when you get down to it.
If this new "variant" is such a terror then instantaneous locking of the borders is reasonable. A several-day delay is not, which means we're talking politics here, not health. Never mind the often-months-long planning delay involved in such trips; you plan them months or even years in advance and who knows what sort of restriction(s) will be imposed between now and then.
It's unpredictable and makes the risk of your trip being screwed -- with you eating the expense of a trip no longer able to be taken -- unacceptably high.
President ****s-his-pants put in place the "test before return" requirement to the US. That instantly slams the door for me on all international travel because a false positive means I get to eat the cost of a quarantine in another nation plus a last-minute purchased ticket and the non-refundable original to get home. That is an instant and arbitrarily-imposed expense of many thousands of dollars and literal imprisonment even if the positive is false. Are you so-stupid that you will spend thousands to travel internationally complete with a risk of being effectively jailed for two weeks by your own government?
My answer is simple to the imposition of such bull****: **** everyone involved in that crap and every business that would sits back and allows it while extending their hand asking for my money and double-****, by Mr. Hands, Rochelle Walensky and Biden.
I get it: Some people and many governments are freaking out and have been for the last couple of years. So what? Much of this is flatly-obvious performative art, such as Biden and Fauci both "wearing masks" when the cameras are on, and not whenever they think they're off. This isn't confined to heads of state; Pelosi was infamously caught not doing so either, as have countless other officials (e.g. Lori Lightfoot.)
Simply put Just Say No folks.
I love to travel but I refuse to go places and spend money where its not wanted and appreciated. There are places of sanity, even in insane states such as Illinois. Trust me on this; I've attended a few events where despite alleged "mask rules" nobody gives a wet crap and personal choice is all there was. I've chosen to walk out of a restaurant when greeted by a person at the door in a mask with a sign on the door demanding I wear one, only to find across the street a very nice place with a gal that has an actual face and no hassles whatsoever, ala 2019.
If hotels, conveyances and attractions want my money they will cut this crap out on a durable basis, and the longer the timeline on my planning before I go do a thing the longer they will have to cut the crap before I will believe them. For some states, such as Colorado, they're on my blackball list this season for skiing because the places I want to go are still playing the performative art game in their public-facing pronouncements and I have no way to know if they mean it. Others, which have been barred from doing it by legislative action, are on the "open" list and I have and will redirect my dollars there.
Internationally there is no open list since Brandon -- and his cohorts elsewhere -- can change their minds as often as Brandon changes his Depends and their decisions may well cost me some or all of the funds I had planned for that trip. If caught on the wrong side of the border when something like that happens it may well cost me thousands or more of unplanned and immediate expenditure along with forfeiting the rest of what I did plan to spend to get home.
I'm not doing it folks. I will instead withhold my spending and redirect it where it is wanted and appreciated. If that ruins certain businesses, so be it. Each businessperson makes their own decisions whether to comply, resist or remove their so-called "officials". The latter two can get quite messy and that's fine with me. It's their responsibility to provide me with a welcoming and open atmosphere and experience, not my responsibility to comply with whatever BS they choose this day, week or month.
There is not one leisure and entertainment business that I will lift a single finger to in compliance of these measures. None. Ever. Every single dollar spent in one of those establishments, and every dollar spent to get to them is discretionary and my expectations are simple: You will cut this crap out by whatever means you must or I both hope you starve to death and I will assist in that goal by withholding my funds. The longer your BS goes on and the more-onerous it is the longer it will take for me to trust that it won't happen again, and for many firms that length of distrust will almost-certainly exceed my lifespan.
