The distancing diktats are ruining our world

I’m a little nervous about my first post-lockdown holiday.

Not because I’m worried about coronavirus, of course. As a 36-year-old with no pre-existing medical conditions, I’m more likely to die in a car crash on my way to the airport. It is the strange “new normal” for travellers that I’m afraid of.

With lockdowns easing, and European countries creaking open their doors to tourists, we’re starting to get an inkling of what the holiday experience will look like for the foreseeable future. And it’s not pretty.

Join me if you will, on a post-lockdown break to Barcelona.

From the second I enter Stansted Airport to the moment I’m deposited in the Catalan capital, I must wear a face mask. That’s five hours, give or take, of restricted breathing.

The airport experience involves longer queues, thermal scanners, and lashings of hand sanitiser. I lose my wife in the duty-free shop because I can’t tell her apart from every other masked zombie.

On the plane the atmosphere is fraught. Gone is the excitable pre-holiday chatter and the double G&Ts, replaced by 30 rows of fearful eyes. I hear one passenger mutter to her husband: “I can’t believe the plane is so busy... it’s not safe!” She raises her phone to capture the evidence. It will be on Twitter as soon as we land.

During the safety briefing, we’re reminded that, in the event of a sudden loss of cabin pressure, we should remove our face masks before putting on our oxygen masks. I roll my eyes.

In-flight food of any kind is unavailable, but I’m offered a £5 bottle of water (card payment only). I raise my hand when I need the loo, and wait for permission from a flight attendant wearing the sort of military-grade PPE you’d expect in the aftermath of a nuclear disaster.

On Spanish soil, I’m whisked to my hotel. A masked woman greets me through a glass partition; my credit card is wiped and swiped. A man in plastic gloves takes my luggage, while a phalanx of cleaners in hazmat suits march around the property on a never-ending mission.

In the half-empty restaurant I gaze wistfully at my beloved on the other side of a perspex screen. Our masked waiter regrets that he cannot accept our cash tip.

We take a nightcap in a local bar, where some of the empty seats are occupied by mannequins, a slightly terrifying attempt to enforce the rules and create a bit of atmosphere. Our cocktails are extortionately priced, but with only 10 guests permitted at a time (we had to pre-book our slot a week in advance, and provide contact details for track-and-trace purposes) it’s hard to blame them.

At Parc Guell we must queue for an hour in the stifling heat, wearing our masks, before entry is permitted. A one-way system sends us on the same pre-ordained route as everyone else.

To cool off we head to the beach. Entry is only permitted after a temperature check, then we spend an hour or two inside a marked zone, shielded from the other beachgoers/potential killers. As I take a dip in the sea, a social distancing volunteer in a high-vis jacket warns me for straying too close to another bather. “Where’s your face mask?” he demands. “Idiota!”

Maybe not all of these things will come to pass should I decide to visit Barcelona this summer (if I’m even allowed), but they are indicative of the sorts of measures already in place in destinations around the world.

And that’s not nearly the half of it. Many hotels and restaurants, the smaller (and generally nicer) “boutique” kind, which cannot make money when they adhere to the rules, will still be shuttered. Options may be limited to soulless chains and fast food.

Flight prices look certain to rise, and destination options could be limited. With demand expected to be dampened for some time, airlines might not risk launching routes to lesser-known cities. Some countries might still not permit “high risk” Britons to visit.

At airports, bags might need to be “sanitagged”, while complex new boarding procedures threaten to create long delays. On planes, in-flight magazines have been scrapped. BA has decided to suspend its hot towel service.

There shall be no hotel buffets of any kind. Some are even swapping room service for vending machines.

Don’t expect crowded bars, live jazz or flamenco performances. Every enclosed space (and even some parks) will have tape on the floor. Stay in your zone or face the consequences. Italy’s proposed army of 60,000 social distancing snoops scares the life out of me. Florence’s Duomo is even asking people to wear necklaces that vibrate if you get too close to another visitor.

Lord knows what else city councils, airlines and hotels will come up with in the all-consuming drive to prove their destination is “Covid safe”. And all the while there will be paranoid locals fearful that the return of outsiders threatens to spark the dreaded second spike. If you thought the residents of Barcelona and Venice hated tourists before, just you wait.

I’m sure some people won’t mind all these overreaching regulations. The sorts who post facemask selfies (PP-selfie?) on Instagram will probably sing the praises of this depressing “new normal” – #whateverittakes. But to me, it all sounds like the absolute antithesis of what makes travel such a joyful and worthwhile experience.

It is the sense of freedom – from work, domestic woes, timetables and deadlines – that makes holidays special. They provide the opportunity to be spontaneous and forget the news agenda, to try new things on a whim, to get lost in a city you don’t know, discover hidden bars and raise a toast with people you’ll probably never see again. None of this will be possible in a world of social distancing and coronavirus fear.

I’ll leave to one side the debate about which, if any, of these OTT measures will make any tangible difference to the spread of the virus. Nor will I get into the mental health consequences of it all. But what I will say is that hotels and tourist destinations should not forget what it is that makes travel such a wonderful experience in their rush to prove themselves a risk-free haven. If their offering is anything like I’ve described, I will go elsewhere – as will others.

So where will I go? I hold out hope that Europe’s remote and rural corners will not be embracing the distancing diktat quite so eagerly as its honeypots. Which is why a villa on an unspoilt Greek island, or in the heart of Italy’s lesser-known Abruzzo region, is at the top of my wishlist. I’ll still have to contend with the airport faff, of course (though flying was always a dreadful chore) but I’ll have the freedom to roam, eat, drink – and wash my hands – when and where I fancy. And I won’t have to spend all day staring at people in face masks.