Covid Beginnings
My husband and I arrived in Hilton Head, South Carolina on Wednesday, March 11, 2020 the very day that Covid 19 was declared a pandemic by the Government of Canada. We had booked a one month stay in a condominium resort – our escape from the tail end of an Ottawa winter to the blue skies and sunny warmth of spring.
Although the virus reached Canada in one individual returning from Wuhan on January 25, and the WHO declared a Public Health Emergency on January 30, and the virus was named Covid-19 on February 11, we did not cancel our holiday as the reality of what was to come had not yet hit home – ‘literally’. We had lived in Toronto during the SARS virus, and as contagious and deadly as that virus was, it was relatively contained.
So we settled in for our holiday by stocking up on groceries, renting bicycles, and making reservations for a popular restaurant and jazz club. On Thursday afternoon, our 2nd day in Hilton Head, we received a telephone call from our son informing us that the Canadian government was encouraging Canadian travellers to come home because of the spread of the virus. He urged us to come home.
In Hilton Head it was sunny and warm and people were out walking, biking, jogging, golfing, sitting in outdoor cafes drinking coffee and reading newspapers, walking children in strollers, all dressed in T shirts, shorts and sandals. The fresh scent of salty sea air mixed with sunscreen seemed wholesome and free of “ill humours”.
Our first thought was what better place to quarantine than in Hilton Head. We have already paid for the month and we have food for a few weeks. This was a much better place to isolate than cold icy Ottawa.
On Saturday we went out to pick up a few supplies – toilet paper and hand soap. I also made a trip to a yarn store as I wanted to have some wool for a knitting project if we were going to be in quarantine.When outside we tried to maintain social separation because of the health advisories but that was sometimes difficult..There were no restrictions around social contact and life seemed to be carrying on as normal without regard to the warnings about the virus and safety guideline on the news.That concerned us, and coupled with Trudeau ’s and our son’s increasingly urgent calls for Canadians to come home, finally convinced us to action. We began to feel the pressure about getting home and crossing the border before it closed.
So we returned the bikes, cancelled reservations for the evening of jazz, and left a note with our vacation rental property office, not knowing whether a refund would be issued.
The two day car trip back to Ottawa from Hilton Head was like driving through a zombie apocalypse. The traffic was steady and the weather was good but the circumstances changed state by state as we drove north. Things looked normal in South and North Carolina but in Pennsylvania that state had shut down all public rest stops. All restaurants and stores were closed. When we came off the highway vast shopping centres were completely empty. The fast food restaurants’ drive through service was open but the doors were locked. The only places open were the gas stations but the washrooms were in a terrible state and mostly out of soap – no hand washing!
We arrived at the border at The Thousand Islands after one night’s stay in a hotel, about 9 pm. It was anticlimactic after the uncertainty and inconvenience we had experienced on the drive back. No lineup, some polite questions about our health, an inquiry as to whether we were carrying firearms or ammo (we weren’t) and a farewell reminder to self isolate for 2 weeks when we got home.
“It’s only for two weeks – we can handle that “ my husband replied.