It’s been two years and five months since I was last able to book a trip, pack my bags, and set off for the airport feeling excited. That trip was to Mexico, in January 2020 – a reasonably planning-heavy affair with a 10-hour flight, several stops and internal connections. Yet, although there has always been a possibility your flight could be cancelled, back then it felt like a slim chance, hardly worth contemplating. Instead, I flung summer dresses, sandals and a big old sun hat into my suitcase, and made my way to the airport with only excitement on my mind.
Flash forward to my most recent trip, to New York in early June. We had booked flights from generally well-performing Heathrow, but kept a close watch on our inboxes for the dreaded “Your flight has been cancelled” email – the one that (despite the statistics) seemed more of a certainty than a rarity during those first days of June. The days ticked down until the flight date, each morning laced with the possibility of a cancellation notice.
At that point we still had to take an antigen test on the day before a flight to the US, so I couldn’t even get half-excited until my Randox confirmation – also known as “£40 out of my cocktail budget” – pinged into view at 5pm the night before. Even then I woke at the crack of dawn and dashed to the airport hours earlier than I usually would have, picturing hundreds of harried, bickering holidaymakers battling to get through security queues trailing out of the terminal door. Excitement, to be frank, was low on the list.
I woke at the crack of dawn and dashed to the airport hours earlier than I usually would have, picturing hundreds of harried, bickering holidaymakers battling to get through security queues
Summer 2022 may be the dawn of many long-closed travel destinations reopening to us Brits – but it’s mainly the summer of travel anxiety or, as we at The Independent have dubbed it, “travxiety”. If your airport isn’t one of the many that have been plagued by hours-long queues and missed flights, it’s probably one of the ones where flights have been cancelled last-minute. You’ll probably have a small meltdown over whether to bring a checked bag, as some airlines and industry folk have warned people not to, or try to cram in as much as possible to a carry-on just in case your hold luggage ends up elsewhere.
And that’s if you’re generally ready to go, passport in hand. Many British travellers who applied for their passports in the…
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