With international borders mostly opened to travellers and vaccines available, longtime Sea to Sky local Amelia Olafson was ready to finally revisit a typical shoulder-season tradition after two long years.
She escaped rainy B.C. in early November in search of warmer weather and surf-able waves, first heading to the south of France for 10 days and then hopping across the Mediterranean to Marrakesh, Morocco on Nov. 12.
At the time, the only requirement to enter the country was a negative PCR COVID-19 test result, which Olafson easily obtained in France.
“It was really, really cool. Pretty nice weather; not too hot, but really good surf, pretty good food,” said Olafson of Morocco. “Everything seemed to be going pretty smoothly.”
That is, until the country’s foreign ministry abruptly announced on Sunday, Nov. 28 that it would halt passenger flights into Morocco for a two-week period, after concerns emerged about a new COVID-19 variant, Omicron. The measure—set to take effect at 11:59 p.m. the following day—sparked a series of chaotic domino effects and put travellers like Olafson “into a panic,” she said.
Though researchers still haven’t determined whether the heavily mutated variant initially detected in South Africa in late November spreads faster or results in more severe illness, early evidence suggests Omicron could be more transmissible.
Morocco’s decision came just hours after Israel’s announcement that it was similarly closing its borders to foreign travellers in response to the new variant. A few days prior to the complete border closure, Morocco had already prohibited entry from South Africa and six other African nations, and barred flights to and from France due to a rise in Europe’s COVID-19 cases.
“They said to the French, you basically have approximately two to three days to get on flights out of the country. So I booked a flight out of Morocco because I was like, ‘OK, this is nerve-racking,’” recalled Olafson. She decided to cut her trip short, “because I didn't want to get stuck there.”
She booked flights through Ryanair and Air Canada that would first take her to Portugal, and then home.
“Then less than a week later, the [Moroccan] government just decided to do no flights in or out,” she explained. Her flight to Portugal was cancelled, and hours and hours spent trying to contact the Canadian Embassy resulted in nothing but automatic messages and email replies.
“The Canadian Embassy in Morocco was basically like, ‘You were warned not to travel,’” she continued. “They were no help.” Olafson scoured social media to find information about the closures and whether any airlines were still operating outgoing flights, and managed to book a seat with Air France out of Marrakesh.
“Closer to my flight, I just wanted to check my email and reservation to double check what time my flight was,” she explained, “And it said that my reservation just didn't exist. Then I was back at square one.”
In all, Olafson had three flights cancelled before she managed to find a spot on an Air Maroc repatriation flight to Paris, and eventually on another flight back to Canada. She arrived back in Whistler on Sunday night, Dec. 5. She estimates she spent about $1,000 on unexpected costs like cancelled and re-booked flights, plus price-hiked COVID-19 tests.
“I honestly cried tears of joy after being on my phone for, like, 10 hours,” she said. “It was just a relief to get to the airport. Because [the Moroccan government’s announcement] really did put everyone into a state of panic and then [the government] changed their minds, like, 24 hours later. They should have just allowed the flights to continue that were taking people out instead of cancelling them all.”
Asked what her advice would be to anyone looking to travel internationally at this point, Olafson said, “I thought I was good to go and safe. I guess I probably wouldn't do it again, because things change so quickly. Unless you're prepared to stay for a super long time, I wouldn't recommend it.
“It's just chaos and stressful with all the confusion between rules.”
