RE: Kata Tjuta in a Robson R44
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Yes will be a while until we are back seeing how hostile oz is becoming to returning citizens.
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Yes will be a while until we are back seeing how hostile oz is becoming to returning citizens.
Yep, they are really tightening up. Making travellers pay for their own 14 day hotel lockdown. They're figuring citizens had ample time to return by now. Melbourne is in a bad way. Sydney starting to ramp up seemingly. Might be good to maintain the pirate life for a little longer.
Seems they are just buying into local anti travel sentiment which is sad for a nation of travelers. The airport is still closed here; lots of Aussies here in Grenada waiting to come home who have not been able to yet. Would be similar in a lot of places around the world. Basically lots of essentially abandoned citizens with the current level of Australian flight restrictions and fees and a prime minister saying they should have come home before now; when the airport here is still a month away from opening (if it even does then). We have some friends who are pregnant and have been desperately tying to get home for 4 months and have had their flights cancelled multiple times with airport closures extended. Compared to what we have observed over the past four months with other nations who have been chartering repatriation flights all over the world the Australian response from embassies we have contacted has been limited and basically get to LA or London (or a few select cities in Asia) and we can help you from there. If you google what Germany has done to bring their citizens back home, Australia has put in about 1/30th of the effort on a per capita basis. Anyway we wont be coming home soon.
There'll be a lot of issues to come out of how the government have done certain things, the repatriation of our citizens among them. Other countries have done so much and here we are doing not much. Still, I'm not surprised.
I hope you guys are safe though. Best to stay put for now I think.
The sad part is the negative comments on the Facebook smarttraveler posts against citizens trying to return. I don't see how they can run with 'Caps' on entry into into the country. Who pays for everything aside, you cant deny citizens entry into their own country which is what is happening. We have seen people with valid tickes get stopped from leaving at the last minute after they purchased tickets because of the new quota last week. There is talk of all the expat aussies in Bali being sent home by Indonesia (7k of them); are we going to deny them flights home when their visa expires. Where are they meant to go then? You have a responsibility for your own citizens even if you don't like what they are doing. Likewise I think there are 100k Australian expats in HK. If things get worse there in terms of Chinese govt invention they might start flooding home; but with caps in the 400-500 limit into the major states (perhaps 2k for the whole country) it would take months get them home if they took the whole quota. Where do people expect them to go? It is basically impossible to get home at the moment for most people with these limits. We are used to getting 8.5 million tourists per year. So we normally have 23k per day arrivals mostly into Sydney and Melb (if averaged over the year; prob more like 100k a day in peak season) . And we claim we can only process 500 a day now in hotels? It is a joke to cover bureaucratic ineptitude in Melbourne at their quarantine system.
They call it the new normal, but I'm not sure how the word normal applies to be honest. I'm glad I'm here and not OS trying to get back. I hope you guys stay safe and avoid any shenanigans.
I am not sure I want to come back TBH.
I hear you. Don't really blame you either.
Was talking about you guys with my bro this afternoon when out shooting. He lives in Cairns, just down for dad's funeral. He sails a bit, (is a marine architect). Wants to do what you're doing, take his family sailing for an extended period. He is working towards it. He wants to detach from society a little more. Sounds good to me.
The more time you spend away from society the less one wants to come back ;-). We are mostly self sufficient for extended periods. Make our own power (wind and solar), make our own water, catch fish, can move with the wind.
That's what my brother is looking for; To be more in control rather then being swept along with societies whim.