The Lost Vacation (and now found)

With the current viral pandemic, we have had to cancel our next vacation.  All flight reservations were made; all accommodations and a cruise were reserved.  Looks like we will be able to cancel the cruise and one accommodation with no penalties.  The other accommodations are allowing credit toward a future stays within a time limit.  Other flight refunds or credits are questionable.  We would love to take this trip at a future time with healthier conditions.  We expect no refund from the other airlines; they may stop the flights or even end up bankrupt.

The outline of the trip was to fly United (canceled with future credit) to DC to visit our son's family.  Then fly SAS to Copenhagen and SwissAir to Zurich.  At Zurich we would buy Swiss Rail passes and take the train to Luzern.  We had an apartment in central Luzern reserved for five days and planned to do day trips from there.  Next we would take the train to Wengen where we had hotel reservations for five days.  Wengen is a mountain village served only by train, no cars allowed, which overlooks the beautiful valley of Interlaken.  Again, we would do day trips using our rail passes or go hiking.

From Wengen, we would return to Zurich by train for an overnight hotel stay to catch a flight the following day; Swiss Air to Copenhagen.  We had an overnight reservation at the Marriot AC Hotel there (canceled with no penalty), and would then meet our Royal Caribbean cruise (canceled no penalty) the following day.  The eleven-day cruise heads north to the Arctic Circle with stops along the Norwegian coast.  Returning to Copenhagen, we then board Norwegian Air flights to London and onward returning to Denver and home.

It still seems like a great plan for a trip, but one that is best done in mid-summer.  We would have been visiting the Arctic Circle in mid-June; a time of year when the sun never sets.  On a previous trip (on our way to Croatia), a fellow traveler at Copenhagen told us how beautiful and unique the scenery is along the coast of Norway.  How cool would that be!

A recent email from our new acquaintance, Fabricio, at Madeira stated that all tourists had left the island by mid-March, the island is under lockdown, and he is out of a job.  The overwhelming majority of tourists to Madeira come from Europe, which gives us some idea of the situation in Europe.  I really doubt that the situation will be safe for travel by late May.  

NOTE:  It is now June 2021, and we are re-assembling our trip to Switzerland for this Fall.  We first fly to Omaha for my mother's 103rd birthday and to see some HS friends.  A quick flight to Chicago sets us up for first class flights to Zurich with a stop in Keflavik.  We have Switzerland stops arranged in Interlaken, Lausanne, and Luzern as well as Zurich; sixteen days total.  Much of our hotel cost has already been paid due to deposits from our previous canceled 6/20 trip.

We will buy Swiss Travel Passes which cover almost all public transport including boats.  The Passes also cover some museums and lifts.  In one village where we are staying, no cars are allowed.  We looked at adding some southern destinations to this trip (Istanbul, Malta), but couldn't find any that really interested us; the trip will be 27 days long as is.  Then it is first class Icelandair to Washington, DC, to visit our son and family.  Finally, we fly first class Delta Airlines back to Denver.

Can we justify first class air due to COVID concerns?  Regardless, we have found that we arrive more rested and don't pick up illnesses.  Such flight prices are reasonable right now.