Trains, masks and a ‘Pandemic Wall’ – three tales from the new normal
AUSTRALIA ‘Life in Perth feels no different to when I left in early February’
Ronan O’Connell
“Oh yeah, the pandemic,” said Ross casually, as we sat watching our team batting in Perth’s Winter Cricket Competition early this month. “We had a little bit of a lockdown here, but that was ages ago.”
Ross had just asked me where I’d disappeared to this year, and now he and our team-mates were exchanging surprised looks as I detailed the stressful four months I’d just spent in Ireland, under heavy lockdown for a lot of that time. “Ah well you can forget about all that Covid crap now Ronan, you’re safe in Perth”.
To people in most parts of the world, I imagine that statement would sound ridiculous. It would smack of ignorance or denial. Not long ago I, too, would have found it bracing. But having settled back into my hometown of Perth, after returning from Ireland in mid-June, I understand why people here are so bullish about their safety. They are, after all, living behind the “Pandemic Wall”.
That’s just one of the monikers given to the raft of tough measures that have allowed Western Australia to go an extraordinary three months without a single community-based Covid-19 infection. Put simply, the virus is not circulating in this state of 2.7million people and it hasn’t been for a long time.
The only recent infections were detected in WA’s harsh mandatory quarantine, which requires residents returning from overseas to be locked in a hotel room for 14 days and to test negative for Covid-19 before being released. It was Victoria’s failure to enforce this same policy that led to its recent spike in infections and the fresh lockdown of Melbourne.
While Australia’s two most populous states, Victoria and New South Wales, only closed their borders in July, WA declared itself a nation within a nation in April when it shut its 1,200-mile border with the rest of the country. As a result, Perth may just be the safest city on the planet right now. That’s the claim Mark McGowan, the WA premier, made recently.
It rang true with me a couple of weekends ago. After we won our cricket match I met my wife, baby boy and sister for lunch in a crowded shopping centre food court. Not a surgical mask in sight. In fact, the last person I saw wearing one was a staff member at the hotel where I finished my quarantine.
After cricket and my food court feed, I went to the cinema, an experience I’d craved while in lockdown in Ireland. The next morning I worked off my movie-snack calories in a busy gym, where buff young people exchanged handshakes and fist bumps. My body still aching from cricket, I had a deep-tissue massage that afternoon.
I felt sorry for the masseuse trying to ease a very large body of four months’ worth of pandemic-induced tension. “How is it possible to feel this relaxed amid a global catastrophe?” I thought to myself as I left the massage studio, with a smidgen of guilt.
Then I handed another daunting task to a service worker. It had been five months since I’d had a proper haircut. “It shows,” said my hairdresser. As streams of people walked by her salon inside a shopping centre, I remarked at how busy the complex was. “It’s more crowded than before the coronavirus,” I said to her. She nodded but added some crucial context: “People aren’t spending much money though.”
From a financial perspective, WA was and still is heavily affected, with many businesses having been damaged and thousands of jobs lost. But in terms of safety, WA residents have been extremely lucky. Life in Perth right now feels no different to when I left in early February, a month before the World Health Organisation declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. As we’ve seen in Victoria, though, things can transition from great to ghastly very quickly. That’s why we WA residents are happily hiding behind our Pandemic Wall.
B R I TA I N A journey where face masks aren’t mandatory: the first post-lockdown steam rail tour
Daniel Puddicombe
After a 123-day coronavirus-induced hibernation, steam trains returned to the main line this week, with Crewebased Saphos Trains being the first company to have a green signal to resume operations on the national network. Its first trip was the “Fellsman” rail tour, a 300-mile out-and-back journey from Crewe to the border city of Carlisle via the spectacular Settle and Carlisle Railway – one of the most scenic routes in the UK. As you would expect, things were slightly different on board – the staff wore PPE at all times, hand sanitiser stations were installed in the vestibules, clear Perspex screens could be found between the bays of seats, and the overall capacity has been cut by around 40 per cent per carriage to permit a seating plan that adheres to the Government’s social distancing regulations.
If the transformation makes the journey sound like a complete nightmare, don’t fret – the Perspex screens have been fitted in a way so that they are barely noticeable in the BR Mk1 carriages and (most importantly), passengers do not need to wear face coverings while on board. Within five minutes of being installed in my First Class seat, I felt at ease; it was obvious that Saphos had thought of a solution to every conceivable problem.
Crucially, the main reason to travel behind steam – the experience of being hauled by the closest thing man has created to a living and breathing object – remains as before, especially when we reached the S&C, which, with its challenging gradients and spectacular scenery, is easily the highlight of the trip.
In some ways, the service has improved compared with pre-Covid trips. I was in the Premier Class, where passengers are served a four-course breakfast and a fivecourse dinner at a leisurely pace during both legs of the journey. Everything is cooked on board in a kitchen carriage and I quickly realised that because the stewards didn’t have to look after as many diners as normal it meant they weren’t rushed off their feet. The food itself is as good as you would get at a high-end restaurant and is still silver-served, as before, so the experience of travelling back in time to the golden age of rail travel has not disappeared.
The attention to detail is probably helped by everything being done in-house – the company, a subsidiary of Locomotive Services Limited – uses its own locomotives and rolling stock, and employs its own hospitality and engineering staff. I was told that the team spent three weeks preparing for the first trip to make sure everything ran smoothly.
At water stops, normally a scrum of people pushing and shoving to get the perfect shot of the locomotive as it pauses to replenish its tender, staff were on hand to ensure people stayed apart. A regular traveller on steamhauled rail tours, I was slightly apprehensive that the changes being put in place would have diminished the overall experience, but I needn’t have worried. Other passengers agreed.
“The way the train has been laid out has been very efficient,” Rosalind Redwood told me, while her travelling companion, Robert, added: “I feel perfectly safe travelling at the moment and it is very well organised. The train has been well run and everyone has been co-operative and considerate to us to make it a very nice experience.”
One of the major appeals of taking a steam-powered journey on the national network is the opportunity to leave the real world behind for a day. You roll back the years to a period in which train travel was to be savoured. That is even more the case during the current climate: you don’t have to worry (as much) about the outside world while you are in the steam bubble.
Saphos Trains (saphostrains.com) runs mainline steam charters throughout the country; the next trip is on July 26 from Bristol to Kingswear and back. Fares start at £95 per person
FRANCE Masks are ubiquitous here, but the allure of oysters, rosé and the wild Atlantic coast remains
Mary Novakovich
Well before travel restrictions began to lift, I took a punt and booked a Eurotunnel crossing and a stay in a little cabin in a Cap Ferret campsite on France’s Atlantic coast. The lure of the Bay of Arcachon’s oyster shacks, plentiful rosé and the addictive scent of pine forests baked by the sun was too strong to resist. I’d be travelling on one of the busiest weekends of the French summer, the run-up to Bastille Day. I didn’t care. I was just desperate to get back to a country I usually visit half a dozen times each year.
Last September I passed a wonderfully mellow week in Cap Ferret, but I knew that July in one of France’s holiday hotspots would be a very different prospect. And it’s proved to be so – at least in the busy villages. The beaches are livelier this time round, despite everything, but there is plenty of space for everyone.
The French, like everyone else, have been desperate to enjoy their vacances after a tough and lengthy lockdown. At the same time, they are more diligent than the British about wearing masks in public.
I wandered around the indoor food market in Claouey in the northern part of the peninsula. Anti-bacterial gel was placed at the entrance and each market-stall holder was masked-up – as were about 75 per cent of the customers.
At the large supermarket next door, a member of staff was at the entrance, squirting antibacterial spray on hands. Masks have become a summer accessory, with many people clutching them in their hands and sliding them on when needed.
At the little boulangerie nearby, a sign informed me that masks were obligatory, and no more than five people were allowed in at a time. This will soon be the norm, with Emmanuel Macron, the president, introducing a law to make masks mandatory in shops.
Before I reached France, I’d assumed the British wouldn’t be welcome, given our coronavirus death rate. When I’d arrived, it was hard to gauge if my assumption was correct – my Slavic surname and unaccented French make it hard for locals to work out where I’m from.
Yet when a woman at a bike hire shop saw my mobile number, she twigged. “That’s a UK number,” she said, delightedly, from behind her mask. “I love London. I used to live there. Such a great city.”
There’s a surreal sense of business as usual, here. The bike lanes are as busy as ever. Cycling is the most practical way of getting around the Cap Ferret peninsula due to the horrendous traffic. This summer, my rented bike came with biodegradable plastic bags covering the saddle and handlebars.
I headed for a restaurant. All staff were wearing masks, although social distancing among tables was a bit hit-and-miss. It was very easy, while sitting on a terrace eating oysters and looking across the Bay of Arcachon towards the Dune du Pilat, to forget we were in the middle of a pandemic. That was until I had to reattach my mask to pay the bill.
There has been a certain poignancy during my visit. I’ve spent many Bastille Days here over the years – dancing until the wee hours in little village bals publiques, shopping in night markets, watching fireworks light up the sky in seaside towns and Mediterranean cities.
The festivities are spread over July 13-14, so everyone gets a chance to party. But not this year. On the 13th, my campsite hosted a little soirée in its cavernous outdoor restaurant.
The French love a cheesy disco, so the dance floor quickly filled when the DJ played YMCA. Nightclubs have yet to reopen, so this was the closest thing to one.
On the 14th all the local activities were cancelled, with the exception of those at the village of Cap Ferret, at the southern end of the peninsula. There was a low-key gathering, but as I walked around my village of Claouey, it could have been any other night. From my cabin’s terrace I could see a few fireworks going off in the distance, but that was about it.
Still, there are oysters, rosé, the scent of hot pine, Arcachon beaches and the wild Atlantic coast. Back in March, I despaired of being unable to come to France for many months – or if at all this year. In case a second wave comes and borders close again, I’m treasuring every moment.