Living up to my spontaneous trait, when borders opened in July I started looking for places I could visit with my South African passport from the United Kingdom. I wanted to stay within the European continent but my options would be limited to Ireland, Kosovo, Russia, Georgia and France’s Reunion Island as I would not need a visitor visa to enter these countries.
I decided to apply for a Schengen visa as this would give me more travel options to visit any country within the European Union. The Schengen area includes Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.
My aim was to leave the UK boarder as I had been stuck here since the lockdown in March having returned from Marrakech, Morocco in February so I was itching to leave the country.
The UK had the highest number of Covid-19 infections in Europe so a number of countries had travel restrictions for people travelling from the UK like on arrival you would had to self-isolate for 7 days, or take a COVID test . Information was changing every day and fast so I made sure to get the relevant travel advice for my destination.
We decided to travel to Kefalonia island in Greece as they had fewer cases of the virus and were accepting foreign travellers on condition that you complete a Passenger Locator Form (PLF) at least 24 hours before you travel. Upon entering the country you would be subject to random testing and if tested positive would be required to self-isolate for 14 days. We also had travel insurance as back up incase of any eventualities and also informed our insurer where we were travelling to .
We flew out from London Gatwick Airport .We had checked in online which is encouraged during this time to reduce face to face contact at the airport and because we only had hand luggage , went straight to security and did the usual checks although the queues were much longer given the extra measures for social distancing . Throughout the airport there were visible signs to keep a distance from each other, use sanitizers and keep your mask on.
Inflight there is not much social distancing as you are sitting next to each other but you have to keep your mask on and only remove it when eating and drinking . There was a reduced menu of food and beverages to keep the minimal contact between us passengers and cabin crew. On our outbound flight we flew easy jet and there was more food options and alcoholic beverages than on inbound flight to the UK . British airways gave out snack packs with water and juice and were not serving any alcoholic beverages
The mood was jovial as we were all too happy to go and soak up in the sun and so we touched in kefalonia airport . We disembarked from the aircraft starting from the front rows, taking turns to ensure social distancing . From there we followed the signs to the long queue at immigration exercising our patience as this was a small price to pay for the joy that awaits on the other side.
Masks are worn inflight 
Kefalonia,Greece 
Touchdown Kefalonia 
38000 Feet above sea-level 
Sanitizer stations
