Hmmm. News reporting that the recent bump in cases was due to Returnees from Spain. I’m not sure that’s proven, but it looks as though it could be on the red list at the end of August.

Never seen the tunnel so quiet. Now in a hotel in Troyes for the night

Yep was super quiet all way down A26. Bit busier on A31/A6.

Definitely less GBs on the autoroute.

In Macon area and on to Massif Central then to Provence. It’s a busy French weekend too.

Well, we’ve arrived in Mayrhofen. Seamless through the Swiss border near Evian (Saint Gingolf) and again into Austria at Meiningen. In fact the Swiss-Austrian border was entirely unmanned.

According to our hotelier we’re the first Brits in this year.

First Zillertal beer has sunk without trace. I’m knackered. It’s beyond a long way. Kids will be hopeless tomorrow.

Swiss motorways were full of Dutch and Germans in both directions. Between Bern and Zurich it was 80kph most of the way.

What do we make of a family taking the “head in the sand” approach, ignoring Test and Trace following a confirmed case of a contact, then not isolating, travelling to France and being dishonest on the “Sworn Declaration” that they haven’t been in contact with any known cases in the previous 14 days.

I reckon that is laws broken in 2 countries, as well as Rule 1.

shop them. Idiots

Just back from France. First point,

Flexiplus is great that it gets you through check in, but is then useless when you are sent to the front of the only open border control kiosk and have to fight your way in, cue a load of agro.

French customs didn’t want to see anything, not even passports.

UK customs did seem to check their on line stuff, but didn’t want to see pre departure reports or those foe the day2, but assume when you upload to Eurotunnel that’s all they need.

I screwed up my daughter’s pre departure and both son and daughters day 2 (ended up doing both last second, see earlier post) so these wouldn’t have shown, so not entirely sure how to robust this system is.

Got “free” grub in the lounge..

Recently came back by Eurostar. Papers checked at least 3 times including by an aggressive UK Borders person – haven’t encountered such unpleasantness since … oh … the last time I went to the US.

Paradoxically MrsJ, who is one of those forriners we don’t want none of (limited HGV driving abilities, no interest in fruit picking) had no hassle.

Anyone know the best way to get antigen tests while in Spain (near Bilbao)? Can I just buy them from a pharmacy?

Plan is to then drive up to Tunnel in France to get back to UK.

We decided not to go to France, but also decided not to go to Peaks either

weeksy
Full Member
We decided not to go to France, but also decided not to go to Peaks eithe

Despite the £400 extra needed for testing and the faff, I’m still glad I did the France trip. It was one of firsts for my family being in the Alps and doing something more adventurous, they’ve even said they don’t want to go back to water parks, and can’t wait to go back.. hopefully next year all this will be a thing of the past..

Also got a gov email today saying they are going to carry out a review of the “cowboy” private testing companies due to dodgy pricing!

It was the risk of our lad throwing up a + on Sunday evening that stopped us.

We’re at Silverstone on Thursday this week, then at Pembrey on Fri and Sat and arguably will be in a social indoor environment a few times over the 3 nights, so if ever there’s a time he may chuck in a +, this would be it.
Whilst I’m not worried from a health context for him, I assume it’d mean you can’t travel and that’s £1500 down the pan.
So we’ll do stuff from home instead this year and have booked Adrenaline alley, 417 and bpw.

39.5 degrees at 5.30 this afternoon when we went to swim in the river. Too hot to think man!

Had a bit of that my end the last few days 40+ isn’t really bike riding weather 🙂

Would appreciate a couple of pointers as we are heading off to France this Friday.

We are two double vaccinated adults, plus an 8 and 5 year old. Driving via Eurotunnel to a house on Ile de Re.

I can’t decide if it is too risky to leave the 72 h pre-UK entry test down to a pharmacy in France or try and book another. Will be returning to UK 5th September. Kids don’t need this under 10 it seems.

I also need to book the 2 day post return tests (kids need this one as well). As the whole system is at breaking point it seems I might as well book the cheapest I can find as you just get told to get an NHS test if yours fails to arrive?

I travelled by Eurotunnel a couple of weeks ago.

I booked self administered lateral flow tests via Prenetics (the provider that Eurotunnel direct you to) for the 72h pre-UK entry tests, think they were £28 each. Their website is horrible though and finding the right thing was hard (and it’s a dynamic site so I can’t even link to what we picked).

I went for that approach for a few reasons – the people at Eurotunnel probably see a lot of Prenetics certificates so they’ll be familiar with them, just doing the test wherever you’re staying is easy and less hassle than booking and going to a pharmacy, but getting a test from a pharmacy was still a fallback option if Prenetics screwed up (didn’t send tests, didn’t send certificate after we’d uploaded results etc). In the end nobody looked at them, but I did have to upload the certificates to Eurotunnel so maybe they already had the info when we checked in and passed border control.

For the post arriving back in the UK tests I used Testing For All self administered tests as they seemed good value compared to most and could actually be bought, unlike any of the really super cheap PCR test listed.

Would appreciate a couple of pointers as we are heading off to France this Friday.

We are two double vaccinated adults, plus an 8 and 5 year old. Driving via Eurotunnel to a house on Ile de Re.

I can’t decide if it is too risky to leave the 72 h pre-UK entry test down to a pharmacy in France or try and book another. Will be returning to UK 5th September. Kids don’t need this under 10 it seems.

I also need to book the 2 day post return tests (kids need this one as well). As the whole system is at breaking point it seems I might as well book the cheapest I can find as you just get told to get an NHS test if yours fails to arrive?

Returned Saturday from a week in Morzine with my family.

A few tips from me.

Getting an Anti-Gen test in France to return home is pretty easy, most Pharmacies seem to offer a drop-in Service, it’s a shame you have to pay for it now. They also have a map/list of providers so worst case, you can stop in Calais on the way home. That said there was a bit of a queue to get it, this was probably because France started to use it’s Vaccine passport on the 8th meaning everyone who had been double jabbed needs to be tested every 15 days to access restaurants / bars etc, those people will likely be after another test around the weekend of the 21st and again the 4th of Sept, but you’ve got a 72 hour window (I think).

Getting into France on the tunnel was pretty hard going, the English side is a bit of a mess as everyone has to go through the same channel, everyone from the likes of us who had all the paperwork in place and uploaded to the Eurotunnel portal to the ones who just rocked up with a passport and a ‘story’, lots of people being turned away and told to complete paperwork with no real way of getting them out of the queue. It took 90 mins to clear the borders.

Returning was pretty easy, apart from one problem, you can’t upload your documentation to the Eurotunnel portal from the phone app, or mobile site, annoyingly I had my laptop with me, but I forgot to do it until it was packed deep in the car. On the French side you’re made to go into the Terminal, show all your paperwork to a bank of very polite Eurotunnel staff and then go through, Border ‘Force’ were lovely (complete opposite of what happened in June) because Eurotunnel did all the leg work, they did the usual passport stuff and we cleared in minutes and there was no queue. Lots of shouty Brits crying “I’ll never visit France ever again!” like it’s their fault that a) The UK has imposed complex rules and arguably pointless rules and b) they thought they could ignore them. Getting into the UK requires more paperwork and hassle than leaving.

Day 2 tests, yeah just find the cheapest you can find from the government approved list. I used Randox despite the bad press, I think they were £42 each. Best of luck trying to swab a 5 year old that doesn’t want to do it…

Also, download the France Covid app, you can use it to scan in your UK vaccine certs, which is especially helpful if like me you live in Wales, because we don’t have the vaccine app, but it meant I could use the French app at the border too! Without the App you won’t be allowed in any Restaurants, bars, cafes, pools or the like and they WILL ask.

Also, I don’t want to worry you, the REAL risk you have to assume is either of you catching Covid whilst you’re away, even if you’re jabbed. If that happens, which admittedly is a long shot, you’ll be effectively stuck in France and you’ll need to sort somewhere to stay at very short notice.

Thanks both, a lot of helpful info to digest!

I’ll echo Pjay, (btw anyone who returned on the Saturday just gone, did you have a car full of Whyte bikes??)

However, randox would t let me select the cheaper test, they wanted 99 like the c19 people. Opted for boots in the end at 75quid each..

France started to use it’s Vaccine passport on the 8th meaning everyone who had been double jabbed needs to be tested every 15 days to access restaurants / bars etc, those people will likely be after another test around the weekend of the 21st and again the 4th of Sept, but you’ve got a 72 hour window (I think).

I don’t think this is right, is it? Double jabbed people don’t have to be tested. Non-jabbed people can use a test up to 48 hours old.

Anyway …

before we left I was fretting that the tests adminstered at pharmacies would not be accepted at the UK border, so I spent a lot of time Google’ing for sensitivities of the various different tests, Turned out that the border people didn’t look once at the test details.

Getting into France on the tunnel was pretty hard going, the English side is a bit of a mess as everyone has to go through the same channel, everyone from the likes of us who had all the paperwork in place and uploaded to the Eurotunnel portal to the ones who just rocked up with a passport and a ‘story’, lots of people being turned away and told to complete paperwork with no real way of getting them out of the queue. It took 90 mins to clear the borders.

For balance we had the easiest drive through I’d ever had.

It seems to me it’s mostly smoothed out now.

Just show the papers at the Border and straight through.

You’re right DrJ, once double vaccinated you don’t need to test again here. To leave france/EU it’s the third country’s rules you have to respect.

Once in Morzine do I have to get a new test for my unvaccinated 13 year old every couple of days so she can join us in restaurants? What about outside seating?

Austria is a conundrum. On paper they appear to be rigid and inflexible sticklers for anti-COVID measures, in practice we’ve found them to not give a stuff. Nobody has scanned our vaccine certs, masks are gone (except in MPries, oddly), the GreenCheck app is not used anywhere we’ve been so far and aside from the odd bit of worn sticky tape on the ground, you’d never think COVID had existed.

Went to Portugal last week with the family.

Antigen test at Gatwick pre flight – 2 adults (not the kids)
20 people on Easyjet flight to Faro in August – bonkers
Lovely and hot on the Algarve (more mask wearing than the UK)
Antigen test 24 hrs before we left at local phamarcy in Algarve (35e) (2 adults not the kids)
Filled in all the forms pre departure from Faro
Easyjet staff checked all this
On arrival at Gatwick Border force just checked passports (nothing covid related)
Had pre-ordered Randox day 2 kits for the 4 of us. £50 each
Did these last night and dropped in Guilford at our nearest box.

Frankly all very easy – await the PCR results from Randox.
I wonder if anyone at Border force etc following up on the testing ????

@ElVino nobody has asked for anything for our 13 year old while we have been here. They do scan the app for adults though.

I don’t think this is right, is it? Double jabbed people don’t have to be tested. Non-jabbed people can use a test up to 48 hours old.

Anyway …

before we left I was fretting that the tests adminstered at pharmacies would not be accepted at the UK border, so I spent a lot of time Google’ing for sensitivities of the various different tests, Turned out that the border people didn’t look once at the test details.

Sorry, what I was trying to explain was:

France’s requires a ‘Health Pass’ to access Bars, Restaurants etc, that’s all people, not just tourists.

If you’re double jabbed, you just scan your vaccine cert into the AntiCovid app and then show the QR code to get into places.

Only about 50% of French residents are fully vaccinated, which means the rest of them have to be tested every 15 days to keep their ‘Health Pass’ up to date, so when the rules came in on the 8th of August there was a huge demand from French residents to get tested that weekend, most of those people will need to test again about 2 weeks later (this weekend) to renew their pass so there will likely be about big spike in demand this weekend, and then again two weeks later, the weekend @Timmys is heading home.

Everyone entering the UK needs to be tested within 72 hours of arrival. So if I was Timmys I’d look to get my pre-travel test as close to the start of the 72 hour window as possible, in case demand out-strips supply, as it did in Morzine last weekend, and the pharmacy stops giving tests after a few hours because the queue is too long, to give a chance to try again the next day, just in case. When I went for the same test, in the same pharmacy in June, we were able to just stroll in.

As for all the “it’s got to be 98% accurate stuff” yep, Border Force and Eurotunnel looked over it, but really as long as it’s got a QR code they don’t care. In fact, the SMS/E-Mail version, which you’re supposed to have never arrived for us, but they took the paper version happily.

Just set my 14yr old daughter off on her trip to Russia this morning. 1st leg is the long rail trip to Euston.

I must admit that its been a huge stress for us (On top of worrying about her on the trip). The Visa (2 x trips to Edinburgh). The PCR tests (Boots cancelled their test 12hrs before it was due so we had to book elsewhere). The lateral flow tests. The paperwork (How many forms do i have to fill in declaring no political agendas and military experience). The cost (Visa £175. PCR Test £100).

This was for 1 person. No way would i be getting any benefit from a holiday for the whole family.

@pj – sorry to nitpick, but the rules are here:
https://www.gouvernement.fr/info-coronavirus/pass-sanitaire
Tests need to be under 72 hours old. Luckily they sorted the NHS QR codes so we don’t need to worry about that any more!

more and more pics populating the socials of folks by their hotel pools making me very jealous!

then a quick read through this thread makes me think its still not worth the hassle…?

more and more pics populating the socials of folks by their hotel pools making me very jealous!

then a quick read through this thread makes me think its still not worth the hassle…?

It’s certainly a risk – it’s a bit cheaper now if double jabbed and all the paperwork is in order, but if you do test positive before your return, you could be looking at weeks stuck in another country, which could be very expensive for a family for accomodation and additional testing, and with people with jobs to go back to etc. could also cause problems.

An Italian friend went back to see her parents in Lombardy – the first time in over a year – but now can’t wait to get back to blighty as it’s too hot.
I was tempted to do a last minute trip to Croatia but I think I will wait until next Spring now. Too much hassle – on top of a normal holiday, which is always hassle.

I know this is lame, but can someone tell me how the in-pharmacy process actually works in France. Do they watch you swab and then you come back 30 min later to get the results or do you hang around while the LF does its thing? Presumably they then issue you a document with the certified result? Basically my French is piss-poor, so the more I know what the process is ahead of time, the smoother it might be!

Also, does anyone know if there is somewhere I can look up current data of cases by location in France? ie. French equivalent of this.

I would say the whole process is very easy – dont let it put you off going abroad. I’m back to whiteroom bike holiday in a few weeks

@timmys In Portugal it wasn’t even a pharmacy. Just a couple of blokes in an empty office block doing lateral flow tests..confirmed we were negative as I sat there. 2 minutes later a letter stating this. the whole thing is a sham frankly!

I know this is lame, but can someone tell me how the in-pharmacy process actually works in France. Do they watch you swab and then you come back 30 min later to get the results or do you hang around while the LF does its thing? Presumably they then issue you a document with the certified result? Basically my French is piss-poor, so the more I know what the process is ahead of time, the smoother it might be!

I think it varies between pharmacies. In Morzine you need to leave the pharmacy straight away (there’s a lot of bodies about) but you can wait outside if you like, they send results via SMS, in June this came through within 20 mins, if you want a physical copy you can return in about an hour.

@pj – sorry to nitpick, but the rules are here:
https://www.gouvernement.fr/info-coronavirus/pass-sanitaire
Tests need to be under 72 hours old. Luckily they sorted the NHS QR codes so we don’t need to worry about that any more!

No wonder they were all so pissy about it, I’d read 15 days…

There were a few teething problems with the app on the first day, some of the cafes didn’t recognise the NHS vaccine QRs, some did, the App, which for me was in English advised them to delete and re-install their app to force updates, but they all refused to accept the issue was their end, so very French, even when I switched my App into French so they could read it for themselves, they still told me it was my vaccine cert. Not that they turned us away. It was working perfectly by Day 2.

It’s a nice solution, wouldn’t work here, we’ve still got Thugs on the street protesting about lockdowns which have ended, they’ve be tearing the place apart crying about “two tier society”.

Not them I’m completely embedded with French news / culture, but I get the impression they’ve got a pretty pragmatic approach to Covid now, they’ve accepted that being fully vaccinated is about as good as it’s going to get for the time being. If you’re fully jabbed, then life is pretty much normal, you don’t need tests to travel, you can pretty much do as you please, yeah masks in shops, but with a much higher level of compliance then I’ve seen in the UK, if you’re not, then take a free test every few days (I know now), it’s done wonders for vaccine uptake.

I know this is lame, but can someone tell me how the in-pharmacy process actually works in France.

In Paris, at least, you give some info to the person in the pharmacy (name, address, dob, phone number) and then someone swabs you in the pharmacy or in a tent outside. Then you hang around outside to give them time. After about 15 min you get an SMS with a link to download your certificate but to get the test info you need the paper one which the pharmacy gives you. They write in the test details by hand.

That’s my experience anyway – may be different elsewhere.

P.s. the bit about the test details is probably just me being paranoid and obsessive. I suspect that the EU have the same requirements as UK in terms of sensitivity and wotnot but I can’t actually find a document that says that explicitly.

.

Ran into our first issue today. We went up the Hintertux Gletscher and tried to buy a hot chocolate at the top of Gketcherbahn1: no entry without 3G certificate! (vaccination, recovery from infection or recent PCR test). Austrian app won’t accept our certs. Fine here’s my NHS cert on their app, NEIN! Ok, here it is in the french app, NEIN! Ok here’s my printed out NHS cert (scans QR code), NEIN! Ok, please read the words: my name, moderna, vaccine 2, date.
“Ok it’s gut, willkommen.”

10 days in and get back in a fortnight absolutely no regrets about heading off to Spain and France. The worse thing so far was the sea crossing from Portsmouth to Santander which was super choppy and semi-isolating the kids before we headed.

It’s been around 40C in Ainsa for the past week and combined with me straining my MCL means I’ve been limited to the greens and easy blues with the kids and I’m not riding anything by myself which I usually would. The wife is heading off road riding at 7am and loving it. With the heat we’ve spent more time in rivers than we have riding been kayaking and canyoning (wouldn’t recommend with a knackered knee).
Got two more days here then head to France on Friday.

The testing is a bit of a pain but holidays like this are logistical nightmare anyhow so it’s just another thing to deal with. We’ve had to deal with much tricker situations on the last two hols.

We’ve got our details into the French app today and going getting lat flows for the older kids tomorrow. We will have spent about £600 on testing by the time we get home so about 10% of the total cost of the holiday which seems an OK premium to avoid spending three weeks in the rain in the UK.

Has anyone used this service for the pre-return testing ?

https://travel.livingcare.co.uk/product/virtual-lateral-flow-test/

Seems like you order the kit in advance, do the test yourself (I.e. unsupervised) and then send a picture to the testing company who then issue a certificate. As mentioned above, just seems like a sham…