- Tomorrow morning, July 8, 2020
I'll be jumping on a plane to fly from Canada
to Frankfurt to be one of the very first tourists
allowed into Europe during the pandemic.
And this video is all about why.
First, though, let me tell you a story.
Obviously by looking behind me
you can see travel is quite important to my life.
I have this travel YouTube page
as well as I'm a TV host on a BBC travel program.
And I've been doing this professionally for about 10 years.
Travel is my life.
And when my wings were clipped in the beginning of March,
I think I can safely speak for a lot of us,
we were a little bit down in the dumps.
During this time, I received a message
from a friend of mine.
He was one of the most talented personal guides
I've ever had in my entire life.
And he lived in Cambodia.
And this is what he said.
He said, "Mike, I am very embarrassed
"and sad to message you."
And I said, "It's okay, go on."
And he said, "Everything stopped so fast.
"I can't feed my family.
"I can't take care of my wife.
"My kids are hungry.
"I don't know what to do.
"I'm embarrassed to ask you, but is there any way
"you can send me some money to support my family?"
I did send him a little bit of money.
But I realized something when he sent that message.
There are hundreds of millions of people around the world
in situations exactly like that
in these less developed countries like Cambodia,
like Mexico, like Peru that depend so heavily on tourism.
And you know, the government is doing zero to help them.
You think maybe they could do something else,
but if tourism just kind of waxed and waned like the tides,
maybe you could find another job.
But when things get cut so abruptly
and you're making all the money in the world
and all of a sudden nothing,
you're thrown out to sea, aren't you?
So my friend, my Cambodian friend is just one story
out of hundreds of millions, I'm sure around the world,
of people who are struggling that depend on tourism to live,
and now they've got nothing.
So like I told you, I'm Canadian.
And right now that's a little bit of a luxury
because where I'm from, at least, in New Brunswick,
there's about three-quarters of a million people here,
and we've only had about 150 cases
and only a handful of active cases at the moment.
So where I'm from, they've created a bit of a bubble.
We don't let outsiders
into our East Coast Atlantic Canada bubble,
and therefore we've all stayed pretty safe here.
Canada as a whole has handled the situation quite well
compared to some other places,
and therefore have been granted access, unrestricted,
to Europe as of July 2, 2020.
What that means is myself, a Canadian,
and other handpicked nations around the world
can travel to Europe, the EU, without restriction,
without quarantine, without self-isolating
when they arrive in any country they wish
that they can find a flight to, at least.
And when this came up, I thought long and hard about it.
Is it ethical to travel?
Is it responsible to travel?
What about these people who are literally starving?
Maybe less so in Europe,
but I'm sure there's many, many, many there
who their entire life depended on tourism, now there's none.
Well, what's the big danger?
I mean, for myself being an adventure travel YouTuber
seeking out some of the most crazy,
insane experiences on the planet,
I'm used to a little bit of a baseline risk in my life.
For myself, I'm not too concerned about the virus.
I mean it is very scary,
and there's lots that we don't know,
but I also think the fear of the virus
is even more infectious than the virus itself.
There's misinformation, this information,
and it's really hard to keep track
of what's true and what's not.
It is a shit show of lies and truth,
and it's hard to know what is shit and what is gold.
For myself, I know I have done the necessary research
to keep myself as safe as possible,
as I possibly can, on this upcoming journey.
But that's not really the main concern here.
I mean sure, if I want to do something crazy with my body
and my life that's fine, but what about other people?
And while I'm not breaking any laws here,
the EU has opened up to tourism
for select nations like Canada, I still am concerned
that I'll contract something in the airport
and then bring it to a country
or person who has not been affected with it,
and that would devastate me.
So while I am deciding to travel to Europe,
originally Germany is where I'm flying,
I am gonna be taking precautions to be able to make sure
that I don't infect anybody by chance I get infected
on my journey there.
So I'll be wearing a mask the entire time,
carrying hand sanitizer basically everywhere,
washing my hands and really paying attention
to the small little details
because sometimes the small little details matter most.
When I do arrive in Europe, I'll be choosing
to quarantine myself, even though it's not necessary,
because I want anything to work its way through my system
if it's there so I don't bring anything to people
who haven't been affected by the virus yet.
What I wanna know, everyone at home,
is what do you think about this action?
For myself, like I said, I feel ready to do this.
I'm sure there's people who don't,
and I'm sure there's people who do.
Let's start a discussion.
This video actually is gonna be the first one
of a three-part series.
Video one, me explaining the why.
The next video is gonna be showing what the process is like
in the airport going from Canada to Germany.
And the third video is going to be
more of a instructional guide, or at least lessons learned,
the ups, the downs, the things to keep in mind
if you are, yourself, planning to travel to Europe
during the pandemic.
Hopefully it'll help you.
But for now, I still have to pack.
It's getting late, and I just have to say
I'm excited to travel again, even if it's different.
Thank you so much for watching, Dragons.
I'll see you in the next video here on Fearless and Far.
And stay tuned for the next videos, thanks.
(contemplative music)