Coronavirus is starting to affect every aspect of life. Most people are living in some fear during these times. The entire world is seeing something related to the virus, so fear makes sense. In this post, I want to talk about my experiences relating to the virus. This post will be the first update of many to come.

To start, I have been living in Cairns, Queensland, Australia, for more than a year. I intended to stay here for about a year to get my visa extensions completed and then make plans for future travel. Right now, I have about a week left or so to complete the work for my third-year visa. Now I might be staying in Cairns for even longer.

Coronavirus sucks. I was in the process of planning a trip to Bali for an event when Coronavirus started to get worse. I decided to wait a little longer to book flights while I watched to see what would happen with the event. It is a good thing I delayed because the organizers ended up canceling the event.

What is Coronavirus doing in Cairns?

Now, as far as things are going in Cairns, we are okay right now. I have not heard of any confirmed cases here, so that is incredible news. The bad news is that the fear still exists. Shelves at Woolworths (one of the local grocery stores) are almost empty. Especially toilet paper, cleaning supplies, and some long shelf-life food items.

The real problems we see in Cairns are the impacts on tourism. It is currently low season in Cairns, so tourism is already quite small. With Coronavirus, tourism is even lower than usual. Pretty much the only work backpackers can find in Cairns is related to tourism and hospitality. So when tourism is lower, all backpackers suffer.

What is the impact on backpackers?

As it stands right now, backpackers are getting by okay, just struggling to find any work. The new self-isolation rules Australia just created are causing the most prominent impacts right now. With these new rules, anyone who travels to Australia from any foreign country must self-isolate for 14 days. For Australia citizens, this should be no problem. For backpackers, this is extremely difficult.

Backpackers usually stay in hostel dorm rooms to save the small amount of money they have. In order to isolate themselves for 14 days, they have to pay for a private room. Depending on where they are in Australia, this will be a minimum of $750, most likely way more, and that does not even include food.

So for right now, the threat of Coronavirus does not seem to be too bad. The impact on travel from the virus is the real problem for backpackers right now. I know that the situation is changing very rapidly, so I will provide another update within the next few days. For the rest of today, I am going to enjoy some St. Patrick’s Day celebrations.

For updated country information, take a look at this website.

To check out more of my travels, go here.