Jamaica to Puerto Rico

Well neither of us expected this. Awake at 7am I couldn’t shift out of bed so trawled the internet and read about the doom and gloom surrounding the Corona Virus outbreak and it became startlingly clear that we had to leave Jamaica early as per the Foreign office advice. Combine that with President Trump stating people from the UK were not going to be admitted into the USA from midnight tomorrow and we realised a hasty retreat was necessary. So a 3.5 hour drive to Montego Bay followed (passing Olive-throated (Jamaican) Parakeets along the way) and once in the airport things really kicked off. It seemed that being UK nationals made us ‘persona non grata’ and unwelcome, but the kind American Airlines lady got us onto the next flight out of Jamaica as we were not allowed to fly as scheduled tomorrow to Puerto Rico. There was not much dialogue between us and to be honest neither of us new really what happening and in hindsight maybe we should have been a bit more insistent about exactly where we were flying to? Hindsight is a wonderful thing (and it's really easy to criticise) but please remember that at the time things weren't as bad as they are right now.....

So, the only thing was the next flight to Miami was in an hour and I had to run back to the rental car to get our luggage, run back in with them and then return to the car and drop it off at the rental station just around the corner. I was sweating when I got back to Lynzi and we rushed through security and to the gate, just in time to board the plane. Believe me, being British and sweating in an airport doesn’t win you any friends! Anyway, the flight to Miami was uneventful and it only took 45 minutes to pass through immigration, security and get our luggage passed onto the next conveyor belt – I think this must be a record! And we were on the connecting flight to San Juan in Puerto Rico before the travel ban for Brits into USA territory began and a short flight got us in at around 11pm where we holed up in the airport hotel. A beer in the bar was very welcome tonight. During the flight we learned from the pilot that the president of Puerto Rico had imposed a curfew from 9pm to 5am every night and most shops, restaurants, hotels etc were to be closed for the rest of the month. Speaking to  the bar staff we learned that although you couldn’t eat in the restaurants you could order a takeout and that supermarkets were open during the day before the curfew began at night. Add to this a few of the hotels I had pre-arranged emailed to cancel and we were really up against it. Oh and there’s only 5 cases of the virus on Puerto Rico at the moment!