Expedition Canada

  Quarantine Begins If the scarcity of people at Heathrow and on the plane made pandemic travelling a pleasure, Toronto Pearson was in stark contrast.  A smooth 8 hour flight was followed, by a 3 hours and 20 minutes being processed through the airport.   I am not one of life's queuers.  I will go somewhere else, go without, pay more or do something different.  This was not an option.  If the number of people arriving made the queues inevitable, the way arrivals were processed was extremely well organised.  Passport control was well, like most passport controls for non-nationals.  Thirty minutes later and purpose of travel quickly established, we were directed off for an immigration interview.   The all important six month stamp Documents reviewed, son's Residency confirmed, pre-arrival application numbers noted, quarantine arrangements checked, and an hour  later we had the all important 6 month passport stamp After immigratio...

There is something to be said for travelling in a Pandemic.  If the pre-flight preparations and paperwork were a little frenetic, getting to the airport and passing through it, was a breeze!  No queues at checkin, no queues at security, no queues for refreshments, and getting 40 passengers on to a 200 seat plane was pretty quick.  We left 15 minutes early.   Departures   As we went through the obligatory bag and personal checks the security manager, clearly desperate for some human contact, was charm itself and waxed lyrical about the new 3D baggage scanners that were being introduced.  Not the usual brusque security checks.  Time for passengers seemed to be the order of the day. Checkin took a little longer while Covid tests, Permit to Travel forms and family links were scrutinised and validated by a Canadian embassy official.  About the same time as it took seven bags to be weighed and tagged! That we were allowed to board we rather hope means a...