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covid 19
Tauck seems to have lost sight of the fact that Italy is pretty much shut down and walled off. I have had only a few communications with my agent who says that Tauck will be discussing it soon. The Tauck announcement on covid 19 seems to have disappeared from the web site. This trip should obviously be canceled by Tauck ASAP. There are no flights by anyone in and out of Italy from the USA.
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Jimmsp. You don’t say what date you are traveling. Tauck has a large number of customers and they are dealing with this in date order, I am sure of that. The stress must be very hard for them. We have a tour booked that ends in Venice in June and we don’t expect anything from them yet under current circumstances. Originally, like others, we hoped that it might go ahead, though it clearly seems unlikely now. It’s not as if you are going to be able to book an alternative tour this summer, or even leave your own home. We started traveling with Tauck in about 2003 and our first tour was Florence, Tuscany and Umbria, so similar to your tour I guess, it was wonderful and we have continued traveling with them since, with just two exceptions including the just evacuated tour I’m still trying to get home from.
By the way, saw your other posts, you certainly are in the wrong place at the wrong time a lot. Mr B arrived in Osaka, Japan the day the Kobe earthquake happened all those years ago. Our recent trip to China in October, Is the next nearest to what could have been a problem until this one now.
Sorry about the date - We were scheduled to leave the US on Sat April 18, arv Florence on the 19th.Tour started on the the 20th, ending in Rome. I do recognize the work they have in front of them, but I have been communicating with them for weeks. Italy was the first in Europe to really shut down. I was hoping for the response - yes we will be canceling the trip, and we will get back to you with the details by xyz, where xyz is their best estimate.
Re being in the wrong place at the wrong time - in those days, I traveled internationally (as well as in US) on business a lot, probably at least one international trip a month, for over 20 years. Occasionally I just went US to Asia to Europe and home to US. With that travel, you can't help but encounter some "stuff".
Be patient Jimms, you know they have to cancel. You will be better off them doing the canceling than bailing out. Good luck!
Jim, I sense a bit of impatience. Chill. It will all work out in the end, if things are not working out, then it is not the end. (Loosely borrowed from the movie, "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel"
) Seriously, no need to stew or vent frustration over something that neither you nor Tauck has much control over. There are more immediate things Tauck has to deal with. I can't say for sure, but they may still have people on tour that they must get home. Just hang in there and Tauck will handle your situation. As for Italy, I would hazzard a guess that no tours will be headed there for quite some time, probably well past the 14 April window, especially with a few reports of people suffering relapses and reinfections. As the saying goes, Tauck and the entire travel industry are chasing a moving target.
Also, and once this is over and once they decide (and are allowed) to restart operations, it will take a bit of time for the travel industry (and the country) to ramp back up- airlines must call people back from furlough, hotels, local transport, museums, etc. etc. etc. - they won't be able to just flick a switch and be back to pre-COVID 19 levels. The quarantines won't end the problem and we may not be back to normal until there are no new cases world-wide and/or there is a vaccine and most of the world, not just the US, has been vaccinated. This won't be a "two weeks and done" thing. This is the first time I've actually admitted that I think my XMAS Markets tour in December and my (re-booked) Jordan & Egypt tour next January could be in jeopardy. I don't want to sound pessimistic, but I think that is the potential reality many of us, including me, are in denial about.
Another thought- everyone needs to look at the (infection?) graph- the two that are being shown are the worst-case steep bell-shaped curve and the less-severe flatter one. It appears we are somewhere between the two. What hasn't been discussed so much are the details. Where exactly are we on the curve, how high will it go, will it peak as shown or level off at the highest point instead of heading downward, will the downward slope be as steep as it is portrayed in the simplistic graphs we are often shown, and what is the horizontal scale- weeks or months? We need to be concerned about both halves of the graph.