Travel 2020 - Before the COVID borders closed - Samet Island, Thailand (Koh Samet)

Travel Memories 2020

The world that we know has changed drastically in 2020, when the COVID virus pandemic hit worldwide, causing governments to close all country borders. In January 2020, I felt the urge to just pack my bags and travel, especially when Singapore Airlines was offering promotional discounts for air tickets redemption. I love beach escapes - sun, sea and sand type of getaways. 

Adding up the costs of the discounted air ticket redemption, the airport fees and transport costs, it turned out to be comparable, if not better than my usual beach escape to Tioman island off the coast of Mersing, Malaysia. And it also offered the benefit of overnight stay in Bangkok to do a bit of shopping and eat some fabulous Thai vegetarian food. With a lot of research online reading tons of reviews, I was choosing between Koh Samet (or Samet Island) or to take a scenic train down to Hua Hin, both are reachable by public transport from Bangkok. In the end I chose Samet Island because there was a resort there that offered backpacker style fan rooms.

When it came to the time of the actual travel during the first week of February, the news of virus spreading beyond the badly hit city of Wuhan, China was beginning to fill the news reports. By the time I returned home to Singapore in the second week of February, governments began restricting flights and announcing quarantine measures for travellers. My partner and I had actually booked another redemption tickets to go to Melbourne and Christchurch in the month of March. And now we are in the month of July, this virus pandemic has created a different world from what we know before the year 2020. 

Here are some photos taken from this last trip pre-COVID 2020. Memories of travel. When can we get to travel again? It is a difficult question to answer.  

Fire Dancer series on Koh Samet

Shot on iphone XS Max

February 2020

世界全球在2020年发生了翻天覆地的变化，COVID病毒大流行爆发，导致各国政府关闭了所有国家边界​​。2020年1月，我感到一时冲动，只想要出国，尤其是当新加坡航空刚好正举行促销折扣活动，机票兑换大减。我最理想的度假地方是海滩 - 阳光，大海和沙滩类型的度假胜地。

加起了折扣机票兑换，机场费用和交通费用，竟然比我往马来西亚丰盛港的刁曼岛的普通海滩度假还划算。而且有曼谷过两夜的好处，可以去购物和吃一些泰国素食。我为了这次出行在网上做了大量研究，读了大量评论，考虑选择沙美岛或乘坐风景优美的火车前往华欣，两者从曼谷乘搭公共交通工具均可到达。最后，我选择了Samet Island，因为那里有一个度假村，提供背包客风格的风扇房。

2月第一周，有关病毒蔓延到受灾严重的武汉市消息已刚开始传出。2月第二周，我回到新加坡的时候，政府开始限制航班机并宣布对旅客的隔离措施。我和我的搭档实际上已经订了另一张兑换机票，要在三月份去墨尔本和基督城。如今已是7月，病毒大流行， 地球已变成完全不同的世界。

这是COVID 2020之前最后一次旅行拍摄的一些照片。旅行的回忆。我们什么时候可以再次旅行？这是一个很难回答的问题。