Planning to travel to or from a red list country? Quarantine outside the UK!

 

After one year and  a half of not travelling, for us the optimists we ventured to travel for work because it was extremely necessary. I do not regret it a minute, it exceeded our expectations in terms of achieving our objectives. We travelled to Uganda on the 4th of September 2021, after the rigorous preparation and filling forms, fit to fly PCR test, health declaration for Amsterdam and booking a quarantine hotel at the cost of £2,285 before travel.

Arrival and processing in Uganda was un eventful since I am fully vaccinated and I had evidence of negative Covid results. There was no need to quarantine, after all I was coming in from the'' United Kingdom''. I chose to stay in an apartment where  I can manage the cleanliness and contact, plus I carried a lateral flow test kit to check myself occasionally. We held numerous meetings and a workshop in Uganda, every one is masked up and conscious about safety, social distancing observed, which was refreshing.

Today I came back, and if you have all the documentation - passenger locator form, negative PCR, evidence of hotel booking, you go through the checks without any hassles.

The downside however is my quarantine hotel Holiday Inn Edinburgh City West, under the North.hotels@travelctm.com   which by the way is not by the airport but closer to the city, so let  not the mention of staying at an airport hotel fool you, if you were thinking of the fancy ones you see at the airport as I was fooled. First of all it reminded me of the prison movies I have watched - prison break, mid night bus, name them! You are welcomed by security, given a table to fill your details, then led to reception where your rights are read to you, key ones include;.

1) You have to request for daily exercise and cigarette breaks

2) There are 2 guards in the corridor in case you loiter around un necessarily

3) Food is left outside your door

4) No cleaning services but you get change of bedsheets occasionally

All the above would have been OK if the room allocated was reasonably spacious. I don't want to come out as complainer, I know we are saving NHS and all, but that has nothing to do with the quality of quarantine hotels. My room is very tiny, there is no enough space to even exercise in the room if one wanted that, the table is a tiny triangular one not suitable for work. When I asked if I can get a high table, I was told that is the highest they have. I ventured further to ask if they have a bigger room, the answer was, the one I was in was the biggest for single occupation. 

I wanted to drown my sorrows in a glass of wine, but you guessed right, they don't sell any drinks! This is day zero, I am not sure my back and neck will be functioning by day 11 when I leave. Watch this space for more insights for those intending to travel to red list countries.

I am wondering how the delegates for  CoP26 in Glasgow from the red list countries will be managed. Colleagues in Uganda were wary of the quarantine process and some did not want to venture into it and planned not to attend in person. I now understand their fears!

Word of advise; if considering quarantine, do it outside the UK, in another country and come back after the 10days