After months of patiently waiting my turn, I had the chance to become fully vaccinated in June. I jumped on this opportunity, of course, and had dreams of hopping onto an airplane floating through my mind while Moderna was flowing through my veins. Well, I turned those dreams into reality exactly 15 days after my second dose (I move fast, what can I say?). With the pandemic still in the picture, travel still isn’t easy but it’s certainly doable.
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My journey started in Toronto and ended in Madrid with a connecting flight in Lisbon. I consider myself to be a fairly organized person and I knew with the pandemic I needed to be prepared. I did my research, checked through all of the emails the airline sent, saved my documents to my phone and set out for my adventure. Knowing travel may look a little different this summer, I arrived just over three hours before my flight took off and lets just say it saved my trip (and my wallet).
A Travel Disaster?
I like to travel light and avoid checking in my luggage if possible. For my adventure I only brought a backpack and a piece of carry-on luggage but I may have made the mistake of bringing my entire bathroom drawer. When I went through customs, I was stopped and although I had made sure my items were below 100ml, I failed to remember everything had to fit into one clear airport bag (1L). The airport customs officer told me I HAD to go check my bag OR throw out my skin care routine. Guess which option I chose.
So, as I was anxiously making my way to check in my bag, I thought my airport travel disaster was coming to an end…..oh did I have a big storm coming. Although I had already checked in online, I had to go through the process again when I checked my bag and this time I was asked for my negative COVID test. I told them that because I’m fully vaccinated, Spain doesn’t require a negative test to which they replied “yes but Portugal does”. PORTUGAL. AKA the place I had a 45 minute layover in! I had never received an email telling me to get a PCR test, because Portugal wasn’t my final destination. Now there’s three hours before my flight and I’m test-less!
I’ve never run to a Shoppers Drug Mart faster in my life! Lucky for me, the location I went to didn’t do rapid testing. So I went online panicking, calling every test centre I could find until I finally found another Shoppers a few kilometres down the road. I arrived 30 minutes before the pharmacy closed and was able to get my negative test results (THANK YOU TO THE LADY AT THE PHARMACY!) just in time.
Moral of the Story
If you’re fully vaxxed, it doesn’t mean you’ll never have to get a COVID test for travel. Make sure to check out the travel requirements for the places you have a layover in (even if it’s only for 45 minutes) at least three days before you take off. This tip will save you a stressful airport PCR test excursion.
