I didn’t see this coming

I worried about a lot of things when Byron and I started our trip in January. I worried that we were making a mistake quitting our jobs. I worried that we’d have trouble finding work when we came back, especially if the economy was in a recession by then. I worried that our credit cards would get hacked or our wallets stolen. I worried that I’d get homesick. I worried that I’d packed too much, or too little. Not once did I worry about the possibility of a global pandemic.

The first time we started to see the effects of the coronavirus was when we were in Vietnam. Tourist numbers were way down, travel bans to and from China had just started to take effect, but apart from that everything was normal. We were told to wash our hands a bunch and not sneeze on people, but those are basic traveling and safety precautions even at the best of times.

Things didn’t get much more serious than that for a while. More countries started to be affected, yes, mainly Japan and South Korea, but even then it looked like we’d be fine as long as we were careful, as long as we were willing to be flexible with which countries we visited.

That was more or less the situation on March 5 when we flew from Bangkok to Brunei, a tiny oil-rich country on the island of Borneo. Originally Byron and I had planned to spend a couple weeks exploring Borneo before flying out of Kota Kinabalu to meet friends in the Philippines and Japan. By the 5th, however, this part of the trip had been axed. Anyone flying out of the US to meet us would face quarantines and other travel restrictions when returning home, and if we visited Japan or any other country where COVID-19 cases had been relatively high, we’d have issues crossing borders for weeks to come.

So we had a new plan, we were going to relax and enjoy being in Borneo, an amazing jungle-covered island that’s largely undeveloped, for about a month. Then we’d continue on to India and Nepal, and go on our merry way.

For a while this seemed feasible. We spent a day in Bandar Seri Bagawan, Brunei’s capital city. My favorite part of the day was an impromptu river boat ride where our guide took us into the jungle to see proboscis monkeys.

On March 7th we took two ferries to get to Kota Kinabalu (KK), one of the major cities in the Malaysian part of Borneo. Ferries are not my favorite way to travel (I get seasick) but flights mess up our budget so we did our best. We spent a few days resting in KK, and it seemed all was well. Malaysia had very few coronavirus cases at that point, and Borneo is quite isolated so we felt reasonably safe. We also had a great setup. We were staying in a modern, 2-bedroom apartment for about $30 a night. We had a kitchen so we could cook most of our meals, and the apartment building was connected to an American-style shopping mall so we could wander around and get any food and supplies that we needed. I barely left that apartment, and at the end of three nights was rested and ready for our road trip.

We rented a car from KK and were planning to take an extended road trip around Malaysian Borneo. We started off with a few days in Ranau, a few hours inland from KK. The drive there was absolutely incredible. Every turn produced a new stunning view. We were surrounded by mountains and valleys all blanketed in lush greenery.

On our way in we stopped at a dairy farm, which I’m pretty sure is a tourist attraction only because dairy farms (and really dairy consumption) is so rare in Southeast Asia in general. But we were quite happy to visit. I’m pretty sure Byron drank all their available milk, but they didn’t seem too upset. We got to pet calves and enjoy the sweeping views.

We also had time to visit a nearby tea plantation, again with incredible views (and great tea – I bought a giant pack of it that I’m still working through). All was well.

And finally we took a day trip to Mount Kinabalu, where we hiked through the jungle and spent a long time exploring a botanical garden at the base of the mountain.

In Ranau though, we started to get even more nervous. Travel was becoming increasingly restricted between countries, and it seemed clear that we would not be able to finish our trip as planned. We still thought we’d be able to travel somewhere, but we knew we might be temporarily delayed wherever we ended up. After much deliberation, we decided that instead of going through India to Southern Africa to South America, we’d switch directions and to the opposite way around the globe, stopping for a few weeks in New Zealand before going to South America. Maybe we could even see Patagonia while it was still shoulder season. We wanted to be careful about where we took layovers, in case we got stuck anywhere, so we booked a flight from KK to Singapore on March 31, followed by a flight from Singapore to Auckland connecting through Brisbane. I was so excited – a month in Borneo followed by three weeks of seeing mountains and sheep in New Zealand, what an amazing occurrence! We resumed our relaxing, confident that this plan would be a good one. This plan would work.

We journeyed on to Kudat, at the very tip of Malaysian Borneo. We stayed at a place called “9 Huts on a Hill” which overlooked the beach. The accommodations there were a mixed bag. The first night was absolutely awful. True to the name, we were staying in a grass and bamboo hut on a hill. Our room consisted of a truly terrible mattress on the floor covered in a torn mosquito net. There was a single fan in the corner of the room. Surprisingly, I slept well for the first half of the night, until around 2am when I awoke with a scream. I’d felt a bug crawling on my face and mouth and was absolutely terrified. I woke Byron up and we turned on a light but I couldn’t find the bug. I was just starting to calm down, thinking I’d imagined it, when I realized the bug was hiding in my hair. It was a three inch long cockroach. I didn’t sleep well after that.

The next day we were moved a room at the other end of the hut with a more functional mosquito net and two terrible mattresses stacked on top of another. Two terrible mattresses don’t really equal one good mattress, but I appreciated the effort. Apart from this initial trauma, we had a nice time in Kudat. The guesthouse (guest-hut?) offers free daily yoga classes on a platform overlooking the sea, and our instructor was wonderful. I can almost put my heels down in downward dog now which is a huge improvement for me!

I knit, we both read in hammocks, and we tried to relax, but it was difficult. Things were getting worse. New Zealand had announced a 14-day mandatory self-isolation period for all travelers, and it seemed like walls were going up all over the world.

We tried to tell ourselves that things were going to be fine. Malaysia still hadn’t seen very many cases, New Zealand was still letting people in, flights were still available, there was no need to panic. Unfortunately, I am very bad at not panicking.

And then Malaysia’s coronavirus case count skyrocketed. A meeting at a mosque in Kuala Lumpur (the main city in peninsular Malaysia) had led to the infection of hundreds of individuals. So even though we were theoretically far from danger in Borneo, Malaysia would soon raise red flags for travel. The situation was changing hourly, and we were scared. Should we leave now? Could we even afford to? Were we overreacting?

For the sake of argument we decided to see if it would be even possible to cut and run to New Zealand. When was the soonest we could get there? We discovered that Scoot, the airline we were planning to take from KK to Singapore, was giving out free date changes because of the coronavirus travel chaos. We could take a flight to Singapore the next day. We didn’t know if we’d be able to change our flight to New Zealand, but there were flights available, so it was possible.

We agonized over it for hours. We had been so excited to explore Borneo, but would we really be able to enjoy it if the threat of new travel restrictions was always over our heads? Ultimately we decided to go for it. Better safe than sorry, we thought. Better to regret missing a couple weeks of vacation that to regret being stuck indefinitely in Malaysia.

The next morning we left at 5:40am to drive the three hours back to KK. We returned our rental car early, killed some time in the airport, and to our relief boarded the plane to Singapore without incident. After we took off, we realized just how lucky we had been. The man sitting next to us told us that just that morning Malaysia had announced that a no-travel restriction would be in place the following day. Everything would be closed. Foreigners would probably be allowed to leave, provided they could find a flight. Byron and I were stunned, we had left just in time.

The next 24 hours were some of the most mentally and physically exhausting I’ve ever endured. Byron will be publishing a post detailing the chaos of actually getting to Auckland in the next couple days (check out riversandmountains.travel.blog for the full story), but suffice it to say we spent about 5 hours combined standing in lines, kept coming up against unexpected hurdles, and were ultimately only sure we’d be allowed in when the plane landed in Auckland.

A few observations about traveling during the COVID-19 chaos:

• Rules are changing faster than people on the front lines can keep up with. Some processes don’t make sense, and very few people have the full picture of what is happening at any given time.
• Overall, the airline employees in Singapore and New Zealand were incredibly helpful and accommodating despite the chaos and the stress they are certainly under. There are exceptions to this, but they are just that, exceptions.
• Some customers are really horrible when they are stressed. A couple stand out examples of this;
• 1. A couple flying to San Francisco after leaving Bali who refused to leave the counter for almost an hour because they were only in extra-leg room sets as opposed to economy plus so they “weren’t getting what they paid for”, which to be fair would be annoying if these were normal circumstances but seems remarkably petty to care about during a time like this
• 2. Parents with two kids who’d missed their 6:30pm flight to Auckland and were literally screaming at the transfer counter employees because they hadn’t seen them waiting in the lobby and gone over to remind them what time their flight was? I’m not sure. People are exhausting.
• A lot of people will offer to help you. During one of our many waits in line we met a really nice New Zealand woman who chatted with us about our self-isolation plans, and gave us her phone number and the address of where she’d be isolating in case we ran into any trouble when we got in the country. We’ve had similar encounters all over the world, and it always does a lot to restore my faith in the decency of most people.

Miracle of miracles, three days ago we arrived safely in Auckland, New Zealand. We got through the health screening, immigration, and customs with no issues. Our bags were waiting for us. In fact, the only casualty of our last-minute exodus from Malaysia was a baseball cap I’d left behind on the plane (sorry Dad, I’ll buy you a new one, I swear!). Well, a hat plus part of our sanity, but we’re slowly gaining that back.

Again, our timing was scarily good. New Zealand has now closed it’s borders to foreign travelers. If we had left just a few days later we wouldn’t have been allowed in.

At the moment we’re a few days in to our mandatory 14-day self isolation. We rented a lovely apartment through Airbnb with a full kitchen, a balcony, and lots of natural light. I’ve never been so happy to be stuck in one place.

After that, who knows. With any luck we’ll be in New Zealand for the foreseeable future. Our tourist visa is valid for 90 days. We’re currently in the process of applying for a working holiday visa, which would let us stay in the country for one year and work temporary jobs to supplement our travel money. Fingers crossed that works out, but I’ve grown wary of making any definitive plans of late!

Still, despite the uncertainty, we are deeply grateful. We are safe, we are healthy, we are together. And finally, finally, we are in a country full of yarn.