Gran Alacant Forum
Gran Alacant Forum => General Discussions => Topic started by: ian-steele on January 11, 2021, 11:46.
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my wife Irene had the cov19 jab on friday, Boris hopes to have the U.K all done by spring, lets hope so have a flight booked 14 april
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Despite my gloomy post, I think there is room for optimism now, vaccination is kicking off and it would seem that people who get the virus are getting immunity so that future reinfection would result in milder symptoms, who knows with natural immunity and vaccination the virus may disappear sooner than we think.
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Something else good. We came to G.A Feb 2020 for 4 weeks, got caught in lockdown in March. All flights back to UK cancelled. Thanks to some wonderful neighbor's on 3.2g we survived till a flight back early July. Our Spanish neighbours Manuel & David were so helpful, taking us to the doctors & pharmacy. During lockdown we went every night on the balcony to clap for the health workers, this formed a bond between the neighborhood, .As we had no car Margaret & Alan across the road took our weekly oder for shopping from Lidl, also supplied us with reading books. Our Admin rep José was a real life saver, he arranged to take me to Elche hospital, also because I could not speak Spanish I could not get a persription from the medical centre, he arranged a 3 way telephone conversation between the Spanish doctor, myself and José to enable Mr to get a Spanish perception, which was sent electronically to the pharmacy. thanks to all those wonderful people
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in response to those who had reactions to the cov19 jab, irene & I had no reactions whatever, cant wait for next jab in Feb, just wondered is you can mix & match, ie had the pizzner 1 first & the Oxford 1 second as there may be a shortage of the Pizzner ones. Good news only on this page please.
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All the people I know who have had a reaction are still going to get their second as soon as it's available.
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Has anyone had the 2nd shot yet ? I’m in 60s and probably due in March . But my mother in law has had first shot a few weeks ago now and will be in for 2nd in Feb /March as well . Someone told me there is no reaction with 2nd shot as it just a top up of what you already had. Wondered if anyone had any news on it as about 1/2 million have had both shots
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Had my first yesterday. Upper arm feels a bit tender but that's all.
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with regard to mix & match jabs, there is testing taking place to see if mix & match can be used which should speed up the injection rate.
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Me and the wife have had our jab both at different locations she had Pfizer I had oxford one, next jab is end of April, bring it on
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Wifes mum has had her second shot (last Monday) - no reaction at all to the first or second jabs
Has anyone had the 2nd shot yet ? I’m in 60s and probably due in March . But my mother in law has had first shot a few weeks ago now and will be in for 2nd in Feb /March as well . Someone told me there is no reaction with 2nd shot as it just a top up of what you already had. Wondered if anyone had any news on it as about 1/2 million have had both shots
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Well we’ve taken the plunge and booked flights for the rest of the year. Prices yesterday were still very good but I noticed on the news today that travel operators reporting a 500% surge so who knows how long they will stay low.
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Well we’ve taken the plunge and booked flights for the rest of the year. Prices yesterday were still very good but I noticed on the news today that travel operators reporting a 500% surge so who knows how long they will stay low.
Always worth the gamble for if it pays off you can take the credit and if Spain does not open its borders or restrictions still apply in the UK obviously you can pass the buck.
It is interesting when percentages are used to create headlines. One booking increased to just five bookings surely is a 500% increase so it might be you that had caused that headline! Well done Wilson.
Derek
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I too have booked flights and they have gone up since I booked them. It's a great lift to finally write Spain on the calendar with a chance of getting there.
Two return flights with Ryanair £160, same dates with Jet2 £380 but they've since reduced them to £340.
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Well we’ve taken the plunge and booked flights for the rest of the year. Prices yesterday were still very good but I noticed on the news today that travel operators reporting a 500% surge so who knows how long they will stay low.
Always worth the gamble for if it pays off you can take the credit and if Spain does not open its borders or restrictions still apply in the UK obviously you can pass the buck.
It is interesting when percentages are used to create headlines. One booking increased to just five bookings surely is a 500% increase so it might be you that had caused that headline! Well done Wilson.
Derek
I don’t think I and 4 other people can take all the credit for the sales surge nationally in holiday bookings. I will always take a gamble when I know the rules, Feb half term, Easter and May onwards were booked knowing that circumstances could change, unlike my angst with last year where those flights had been booked long before a bat got eaten in Wuuhaan. The decisions to allow flights, stop flights, allow flights, all in, all out and the rest of the gaslighting okey kokey is the responsibility of someone else.
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So how do we get a covid test that will be acceptable to Spain and then one in Spain to return to the UK because I think that will still be req all summer unless we get a covid passport introduced and proof you have had both jabs I will be looking to fly out of Stansted but the cheapest covid test I can find is in London at £200 per person and I’ve no idea where to get one for return from Spain . I did here that they were planning a test place at the airport but can’t find it on line
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PCR test at Stansted £99 (48 hour turn round). In Spain, various centres at Elche and Moraira (for me). Alicante airport comes on line for testing in May -AHV posted sometime ago about this.
https://www.collinsongroup.com/en/covid-19-testing/stansted-airport
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IIRC, my daughter's au pair, they live in Putney, paid only slightly less for hers for her flight home to Madrid at Christmas. It was all a bit stressful apparently getting it done three days before, ostensibly with a 24 hour turnaround, and the result arriving only hours before her flight.
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Hopefully those vaccinated won’t need a PCR test to enter Spain post 17/05 , this seems to be the indication from countries like Greece, Denmark etc
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I'm guessing a lot of the anti-vaccination brigade will suddenly decide it's a good idea if it avoids having to take a PCR test or being banned from entering some countries without a vaccine passport.
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I expect the "anti-vaccination brigade" belong to the anti everything brigade. If it was said the ceiling was white they would argue it was black and suggest it was unjust to have such inequality.
Certainly they will find fault in a vaccination passport maybe suggesting it takes away their human rights!
Derek
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re flights & tests, i had flights booked with easyjet for £186 return grom m/cr (self & wife) in march (cancelled) they gave me an option of refund or change flights. I rebooked for April, but this will have to be cancelled, so will now book for early sept, the flight is £30 dearer but you only pay your original booking price. By Sept we hope travel will be back to normal, no way will we pay to be tested @ £200 each going out & the same flying back, i.e £800 for a £186 flight. Hopefully by then vac certificate will do away with the test. easyjet have cancelled flights till 17th May Hope you are keeping well and looking forward to the new timetable for coming out of lockdown.
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Hi Ian
Please could you tell me if Easy Jet contacted you about cancelling all flights till May 17th
as we have rebooked to go on the 3rd May but have heard anything
Thanks
Mushte
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hi mushte, the bbc news said that easyjet were cancelled till17th.may. i have flights booked for 13th april easyjet will email shortly before then to offer me new flights, so don't worry.
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Thanks Ian
Will wait for the e-mail to rebook again :-\
mushte
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Hopefully if we get a vaccine passport we shouldn’t need a test going and coming back. It will only prove you haven’t got Covid at that point.
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More good news!
It has just been announced by Ximo Puig, the President of Valencia, that as of ☀️1ST MARCH ☀️ all bars and restaurants 🍷🥘 can re-open 75% of their terraces until 6pm with 4 people per table (with distance and mask). 💪💪
Interiors of bars will remain closed.
In addition :
😎A maximum group of 4 people outdoors. Indoors, the restrictions are the same as up to now - just the people who live there.
😎The municipal perimeter closure of the 16 cities with more than 50,000 inhabitants that were closed on weekends will be lifted from the 5th March.
😎All non essential stores can re-open until 8pm with 50% capacity.
😎Parks and gardens are opened
😎Curfew remains the same as until now, from 10pm to 6am
All these measures will be reviewed in 15 days 🙏
Great, positive news! 💪💪💪👏👏👏
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Excellent news hopefully this marks the start of a still cautious but positive year ahead.
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hi mushte, i have today received email from easyjet cancelling my april flight, i have now done a free flight changs to september. By the way, i had trouble on ''manage my bookings'' with an forgotten password, so i have a useful telephone No in Manchester easyjet office, so phoned them & they did all the changes for me & emailed me back the new details.
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For anyone booking car rental this year I’ve noticed that there appears limited availability in some classes all seem to have group A,B and C but nothing more, presumably they’ve offloaded stock from 2020 and not replaced the fleet. We’ve booked all with Centauro which are pay on arrival with free cancellation, but I always do a price comparison, there are cheaper deals currently but most off airport. If booking any deal check the terms and conditions as lots are doing no cancellation or amendments allowed which is not always initially clear when trawling through the results.
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Hi Ian
That's handy i see you have given yourself plenty of time
Had a word with my neighbour and said his friend flew in today only the one flight
from Gatwick with Easy jet so was wondering if maybe certain airports are affected
Think will hang on with fingers crossed they my not cancel our flights
mushte
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good news zest has reopened, sadly NINA'S bar is up for sale, shud attract a new buyer as it the best set up in our square, all new fittings, toilet etc.
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Good news.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9317221/Europed-Covid-crisis-Vaccinated-Britons-allowed-jump-Greek-border-queues.html
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Hi Ian-steel, which is, were is NINA,S bar please
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Nina’s bar in in Sierra mar square used to be the Internet cafe
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I spent many a happy evening sat in the Internet cafe trying to print boarding cards, the guy used to charge you for the minutes you were online. Amazing how everything has moved on in such a short time.
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Yep I remember those happy days printing boarding cards and using the phone booths for cheap calls home . No just a few years later we have apps for boarding cards and free video calls . Kinda killed off the Internet cafes in a very short time
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There was also an internet place downstairs at the Carabassi. I remember going down there and putting €1 in the slot to get 20 minutes internet access. They had phone booths inside as well. There was also a telephone on the corner diagonally opposite what is now Molly Malones.
I also remember when we used to go on holiday in the 80's to Spain or Greece and there was always hope that new arrivals at the hotel, flying in from the UK, would bring with them newspapers they'd bought at their departure airport, to read on the flight, so we could catch up on what was happening in the world. Oh how times have changed.
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I sometimes long for the days when we would go abroad for two weeks and the UK could have been wiped out and we wouldn't know anything, ignorance is bliss. The smartphone is a blessing and a damned nuisance. Two years ago holidaying in GA we had " worry of the day" First was son, catalytic converter has fallen off of my car " Next day my wife got a message " mum has been taken to hospital with infection" Two days later" dad has had a bad fall in the garden" and lastly blubbering phone call from wife's sister " had the dog put down". What a nice relaxing break it was.
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I know exactly what you mean Kevin. You are never out of reach and get bombarded with problems that you can do absolutely nothing about - other than worry.
At least in the 'olden' days, when you were fast feeding the pesetas/drachma down the slot in a 'Happy Birthday' call to someone in the family, you could say 'Have to go, money running out' before they got a chance to offload. Ignorance was bliss.
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When we used to go to the South of France to camp in the 70s we had to wait until 5pm to buy an English paper from the camp shop and even then it was the previous day's. The only radio you could pick up that far south was Radio Luxembourg. We used to go a whole month without hearing any English news. Heaven.
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Gentlemen, I long for those days, good luck.
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Thanks Ian-steel remember it well now you have said was Internet cafe, always used it for calls back to England in them small booths
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UK papers are still about £3 when they are 50p at home. They are still carrying advertising, are printed locally so why the big markup. I won't buy them on principle.
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tony best to read the euro news free every thurs from quick save or maxcoop
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These days you can access most Brit dailies online from Spain, I try not to look though.
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Re 1% rise for N.H workers, if for example u r on £400 a week, u would receive a £4 a week rise not enough for a box of chocolates, a £6 week rise for all N.H workers from a brain surgeon downward would not cost as much as the proposed 1%, remember 1% of nothing is zero, 1% of 1000 is 10, lower paid workers always lose out with a % rise , a flat in crease across the board would be fairer in this case.
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I agree Ian % rises just increase the gap . Why not try something radical like a £6 a week rise for all plus a £2000 tax free bonus for all on under £35k a year paid for by taking it from overseas development fund as a one off
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The N.H deserve every penny, please don't go on strike, the public need you @ this critical time.
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https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-three-quarters-of-european-countries-see-coronavirus-cases-rise-12241884
very interesting comment about Spain; See link above
Sky News analysis has found cases are rising in three-quarters of European countries, with the highest increases happening in central and eastern Europe.
Only nine of the 40 European countries analysed recorded fewer cases in the first week of March than they did in mid-February, with Portugal, Spain and the UK registering the largest drops.
Spain is the only country that has a lower case rate than it did at the end of September.
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Not sure it’s really good news but lots of illegal streaming of football etc has been stopped!
An illegal mobile application for streaming videos and TV channels, with more than 100 million users, has been taken down in Spain following simultaneous raids in Murcia and Andorra.
It followed complaints made by the English Premier League and Spain’s La Liga, amongst others.
From Costa Blanca news
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Good news still streaming football on my tablet, have noticed mobdro has been taken down, pity co's I liked to keep up with the Spanish channels.
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I remember a time even before the internet cafe in the square when you had to go into Santa Pola near the castle to use a computer. It was full of all sorts playing games. It's probably gone now as well.
joe
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I suspect internet café will go the same way as video rentals, can't see many opened any more, I've still got my vhs player, prefer them to d.v.d players always sticking & freezing.
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And even more recent going up the library to print off your boarding pass and having to show people where the @ sign was as UK computers didn't have three symbols on the same key. That was before being able to download them onto your phone
Re football streaming - I have Virgin on the go which works perfectly in Spain for all the channels I have at home except BBC .
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Had it not been for the advent of the internet, imagine how much more complex our 'place in the sun' ownership would have been. From the budget airlines relying heavily;y on the web, car hire, banking, etc.
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Yes the web has made life easier, so glad I've got online banking for Spain, checking my balance with Bankinter and sending money is so easy.
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yes kev internet banking is great,would be nice if it was free like u.k, i pay 140 euro to use the banco sabbel, the look after all my bills & a debit card for cash withdrawls & card payments plus regular transfers from my uk bank. Still expensive but as a non-resident i have to use it.
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yes kev internet banking is great,would be nice if it was free like u.k, i pay 140 euro to use the banco sabbel, the look after all my bills & a debit card for cash withdrawls & card payments plus regular transfers from my uk bank. Still expensive but as a non-resident i have to use it.
Ian like your mobile phone you are paying over the odds.
BBVA online banking is free of all charges.
Derek
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Yes, we are used to free bank charges in the UK, just waiting for charges to be the norm at home as well. I wonder what negative interest rates would mean as well.
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hi mushte, have you had your easyjet email cancellation for your May flight.
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Hi Ian
Just had an e-mail from Easy Jet to say our flight has been brought forward by a day
then to say they have change our seats as have changed the plane
So still hopeful
mushte
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good news mushte, hope the flight goes ahead, a little worried that if flight goes ahead & you have not had 2 jabs, that you may have to have the 48 virus clear check which could cost around £100 per person each way. If you or anyone else needs to speak to a real person @ easyjet phone 01617749879 i have had 6 flights cancelled fed up of rebooking on the internet, so they rebooked for me & emailed me confirmation.
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We will have had our second jab by end of April but still don’t hold out a lot of hope for our flight in June. Had 3 cancelled now. With Europe heading into a third wave would be surprised if Spain and the UK keep it out being so close to France and their inept dealing with the vaccination programme. But fingers crossed
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Seems ok to visit Spain if you’re German but not if you’re Spanish 😀
https://english.elpais.com/economy_and_business/2021-03-22/spain-to-welcome-german-visitors-over-easter-break-despite-restrictions-on-national-tourism.html
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Seems ok to visit Spain if you’re German but not if you’re Spanish 😀
https://english.elpais.com/economy_and_business/2021-03-22/spain-to-welcome-german-visitors-over-easter-break-despite-restrictions-on-national-tourism.html
There's an old saying "if you do what you've always done, you'll get what you always got".
With the current virus situation in Germany and the poor level of vaccinations in Germany and The Balearics which are currently quoting a relitavely low infection level of 43 per 100,000 I reckon they'll be in lockdown again just in time for the May Bank Holiday.
I keep on saying it, we have a long way to go before overseas holidays are a reality.
Regards all
John
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It's good news week.... Irene booked in for 2nd Pfizer jab tomorrow, mine on 30th March !
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OH & I Have our second jab on Saturday, exactly eight weeks after our first. I'm assuming it's going to be the Pfizer again.