It's time to dream

As January rolled into February there were signs that we might soon begin to plan for a time free of the stranglehold the pandemic has on our daily lives.

Let's not be so bold as to call this a 'road map' – for such a thing details how to get from a starting point to an end destination and few would claim we have that in place right now – but a sketchy vision of a world where travel is possible is emerging.

In early February, Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary hailed the UK vaccination programme as “a stunning success” before quickly adding that vaccinations, not lockdowns, offered the way out of Covid-19. You would expect the boss of an airline that lost a reported 306 million euros in the last quarter of 2020 to suggest that people should be encouraged to get out of their houses and start travelling again as soon as possible. But he had a point in noting that if all 'highrisk categories' are on track to be vaccinated by February, and half the UK population is vaccinated by April, travel for many could be a realistic prospect by early summer.

Of course, the rest of Europe – and indeed the world – needs to catch up with the UK's impressive vaccine roll-out, but if the vaccine makers can keep up or increase the pace of their production levels some countries around the globe could be ready by early summer to welcome back millions of Brits newly-injected with 'vaccine confidence'.

In the meantime, there is no bar on dreaming and agents can still plan ahead for those sunnier days by updating themselves on all the latest destination news and trends.

Not everyone can go as far as Travel Counsellor Yvonne Campbell, who has relocated to the Caribbean and is taking advantage of Barbados' long-stay visa to turn herself into an expert on the island (see our Travel

Talk interview at www. sellingtravel.co.uk), but for others we hope the following pages offer some inspiration during these bleak and uncertain winter days.

Stay healthy, stay hopeful and keep dreaming!