Life in the Time of Corona Part 10
Life on lock-down is not a constant round of jolly japes and laughs-a-minute, it has to be said, and some of our previous posts in our chronicles of Life in the Time of Corona have reflected that.
However, just taking a moment to look back on the past five weeks, it is important to remind ourselves that it is not all about the tragedy of the situation in which we find ourselves.
As a result of the Coronavirus pandemic, we have found ourselves, along with countless others, devoid of any business. Our Bed and Breakfast was due to officially open on 1st April and that never actually happened. We feel a little like Miss Haversham waiting for the wedding that never takes place, wandering around our house grieving for the thing that never was. Bookings for our creative course holidays were looking healthy for this year, and the main booking period would have been from March through to June, but again, this section of the year has been excised.
We could quite easily have just sunk into the depths of despair, but instead we thought about ways of ensuring that we had a business when this crisis does eventually subside. From those positive thoughts, our #MyTravelPledge campaign was born. We were sitting here with empty bedrooms, designed for Bed & Breakfast guests, and our idea was to offer these to NHS and other healthcare workers who will, undoubtedly, hugely appreciate a short break away in the sun as soon as travel restrictions are lifted and they can take some time off. At the same time, the campaign will both promote our own business and will invite travellers to visit Spain once again, when the time is right. Spain, and Italy for that matter, will desperately need to invite visitors back, when you think that travel and tourism accounts for nearly 12% of GDP in this country.
So, #MyTravelPledge was launched and has since grown. We have been joined by other Bed & Breakfast and self-catering property owners, all wanting to give something tangible to those people at the forefront of this horrific battle against the Coronavirus. As we say in so much of our promotional activities, it is the very least we can do to show our support.
On Wednesday of this week, the campaign was featured in an article in The Guardian and little did we know what the impact would be. In a 36 hour period, we received over 2,500 email enquiries from healthcare staff, all with their own stories to tell. The MyTravelPledge website received over 10,000 unique visits and we are in the process of filming a video diary for inclusion in BBC’s The Travel Show for transmission in a couple of weeks. More importantly, we are being offered more accommodation, so over the weeks leading up to a relaxation of travel restrictions, we should be able to allocate many more free short-breaks to NHS and other frontline workers.
This has definitely kept us occupied, but it is by no means everything.
Andrew, as ever, is designing beautiful children’s books. Although the publishing sector has been pared down to the bones, there is still work to be done, primarily in his role as the Art Director for the publishing start-up TA-DA!. This has been a rather good time for a start-up to get everything ready to attract funding, with a view to getting books on shelves in good time for Christmas. Another investment in our future, we hope!
The garden has also been a major project during this last 4 week period. I admit that I had been burying my head in the sand, somewhat, as far as the garden was concerned. The return of our builders has been delayed, of course, by the lock down, and we can’t lay the terrace outside the studio until they have completed their work. We had also instructed another builder to construct a pergola over part of our main terrace, but this has also been postponed. Instead of letting little things like that put him off, Andrew got a pick and attacked the garden. The pick is, sadly, no more; the head flew off rather alarmingly. The results are amazing. We have a path (of sorts!) leading through the garden; new tiered beds; lots of planted bulbs waiting to spring up; new fruit trees and a vegetable patch. I concede that it is very exciting, but I can’t let it go to Andrew’s head…
In summary, these are a few of our achievements from the past 4 weeks:
Press coverage for our Bed & Breakfast and the #MyTravelPledge campaign:
The Times, 22nd March
iNews, 24th March, updated 31st March
The Daily Mail, 27th March
Travel Trade Gazette, 26th March
The Times, 28th March
The Daily Telegraph, 3rd April
The Guardian, 14th April
Our lovely home was included in a list of the 7 Best Rural Hotels in Andalucia. That is some accolade, when you look at the other lovely places included in the list, so we are incredibly proud.
We have further articles and blogs about our ventures coming up over the next week or so, and it is immensely gratifying to know that we have been able to use these five weeks to establish our business ventures ready for visitors to return.
We have both baked and created new recipes ready for our Bed & Breakfast guests.
We are already planning our cultural and creative course holidays for 2021, knowing that there will be many people who will not be thinking of travel for this year, but will look forward to next year instead. We will be ready.
We are enjoying some great quizzes with the children. Zoom and a quiz is the perfect way to bring us all together. WhatsApp, Skype and Gin are also great for keeping in touch with our friends and losing ourselves in the black comedy of our current status. We have particularly enjoyed the photos of friends bedecked in paper flowers! The more ridiculous and farcical the better, please.
I know that Instagram images of bread-making are becoming hackneyed tropes, but making bread is such a therapeutic thing to do. There is something elemental and immensely satisfying about slapping flour, water and yeast into a bowl, and kneading the hell out of it to then watch it magically swell up! If it turns out OK and you can actually eat it, so much the better! We have made cakes, and biscuits, compotes and soups; we have been resourceful with our weekly shops, and made sure we freeze anything left over to be used another day. Recipes unite us with other people through Facebook, as we share pictures of the appetising and the not-so-appetising results of our labours. The daily exchange of little things between us and our wonderful neighbour brightens even the gloomiest of days. Not knowing why we gave her a chocolate rabbit for Easter Sunday, Mari-Petra was confused, so we found a blog post, written in Spanish, that gave an overview of Easter customs and traditions. The next thing we knew, Mari-Petra had sent a message saying that our Easter present was hidden in the front garden. There, concealed in the lavender and geraniums, were 6 eggs from her hens.
Yes, the world outside is still horrible but today has been a good day. The radio has been tuned to uplifting anthems from the 1990s, we have been busy sending out press releases, working on books, gardening and quizzing with the children. Chocolate tart has been eaten, and Alfie has had his misty morning walk. We derive enormous pleasure from inspecting the first shoots of our gladioli. The work that Andrew is putting into the garden takes me back to the simplest of thrills I used to experience when I was a child, working with my father in the garden, and the excitement we both felt when seeds started to sprout. Who needs to go shopping when we will have tomatoes, melon, aubergines, spinach, and beans all produced in our own little garden?
When you manage to find the right combination of positive activities that manage to block out the bad news, even if for a moment, there is the smallest (and I emphasise the word ‘smallest’) thought that lock-down is really quite alright. We can fill the days, we can achieve a lot, we can momentarily set aside the fact that the world is a bleak place right now, but nothing fills the gap left by our friends and families when all we really want is a great big hug.
If you would like to read earlier posts in our chronicles of Life in the Time of Corona here in Spain, please click on the links below:
