This week I write to you from a safari lodge in Tanzania, the guilty survivor of another round of pandemic-age travel roulette. Tanzania stayed off the hotel quarantine list, but neighbouring Zambia, along with nine other African nations, are now red-listed and effectively off-limits to travellers. Two of my fellow travellers made frantic phone calls and PCR clinic visits in order to fly home early, because they have a funeral they’d be devastated to miss due to quarantine or flight chaos, should anything change. I decided to roll the dice, trust my contacts (who include a barman in Whitehall) and stay… but I knew I was risking a major work project next week, and potentially complicating my family Christmas in California. 

All being well, I fly home from Tanzania tonight, a winner of sorts in this horrendous holiday Squid Game. Friends haven’t been so lucky, and face huge bills when they return home, or have had their holiday hopes crushed again. My friend, Jess, was due to visit her family in South Africa, a long-awaited tearful reunion that now costs an extra £2,000 per person in quarantine costs, pushing it out of their reach. 

Back in January I began idly daydreaming about my big post-lockdown adventure, a safari – the sort of soul-stirring wildlife encounter that would make up for that grim winter lockdown and make me feel like myself again, because I am at my best when I travel. I also hoped this was a reasonable and responsible time to encourage travellers back to these hard-hit, tourism-reliant destinations. I spent 18 months weighing up the risks of travel – including the risks of bringing an infection into a vulnerable community. I waited this long to travel internationally, and Tanzania was my first long-haul trip since March 2020… But despite all my efforts to get it right, I still got it wrong.