U. S. tourism shifts as some ‘ snowbirds’ skip usual winter vacation

PHOENIX — This is the first winter in five years that Steve Monk and his wife, Linda, haven’t driven to Arizona from their home in Prince Albert, Canada.

They typically leave to hunker down in the warmer climate for six months. They could f ly, skirting travel restrictions at the border, but they’d rather “freeze their buns off ” than go to the U. S., where coronavirus cases and deaths are surging.

“It’s not worth taking a chance. It’s not nearly as bad in this country as it is down there,” said Monk, 69. “Pretty much every Canadian person we do know that goes down [ to the U. S.] is not going. It’s pretty widespread.”

“Snowbirds” like the Monks, often retirees who live somewhere warm like Arizona or Florida part time to escape cold weather, won’t be f locking south this winter. For Canadians who drive, nonessential crossborder travel is banned until at least Dec. 21. For some, it’s fear of the virus.

While their absence is being felt by vacation rentals, restaurants and shops, RV parks and campgrounds are seeing more campers as people travel closer to home.

A huge chunk of the snowbird population is Canadian. Evan Rachkovsky of the Canadian Snowbird Assn. said most people he’d spoken with were suspending trips to the U. S.

But some are still adamant about going.

“Some tell me just simply this is something they’ve been doing for 10, 20, 30 years, so it’s habitual in that sense,” Rachkovsky said. “It’s a lifestyle as opposed to vacationing for two weeks.”

For those who go, they may face recommendations to quarantine for up to two weeks, though states often don’t enforce it. They’re also going into communities where hospitals are normally busiest during winter, and COVID- 19 could overwhelm them.

Health insurance hurdles are deterring retired Toronto accountant Mel Greenglass, who for almost a decade has spent four months in Florida.

Canadian snowbirds must buy a supplemental plan to their governmentprovided coverage for any emergencies during their stay. It would have been $ 2,800 for him and his girlfriend this season, up from $ 1,800, and he feared they wouldn’t be covered if they caught the virus.

Insurers “are not going to lay out a lot of money to cover everybody just by raising their premiums a little bit,” said Greenglass, 78.

Snowbirds’ plans have a huge effect on tourism. In Florida, 3.6 million Canadians visited last year, making up a quarter of its foreign tourists, according to the state tourism office. Visit Florida estimates that only 15,000 Canadians arrived between April and September, the last month with available statistics. That’s about a 99% decrease from the same period last year.

The Arizona Office of Tourism said an estimated 964,000 Canadian visitors were responsible for $ 1 billion of the $ 26.5 billion in tourism spending last year.

In September, visitors overall spent $ 752 million, down 60% from the $ 1.9 billion expected in a normal year.

Bruce Hoban, co- founder of the 2,000- member Vacation Rental Owners and Neighbors of Palm Springs, said property managers who rent condos to snowbirds for two- to three- month stints were having a hard time.

But vacation rentals for stays under 30 days have been “through the roof.”

“It’s a big shift,” Hoban said. “Yes, we lost 2 ½ months of what is normally our most expensive, highest time of the year because of Coachella festivals and stuff. We lost all that. We have more than made up for it since then.”

But shop owners like Julie Kathawa, 49, aren’t expecting big business from younger vacationers.

Julie’s Hallmark sells cards and gifts in Bermuda Dunes, outside Palm Springs, and feels the crunch of fewer snowbirds, who make up about 20% of her business from November to April. She’s relying mostly on online orders.

“I’m grateful for it,” she said, “but it’s not the same.”