Regina couple still stuck in Mexico, scared of flights home

While many Saskatchewan snowbirds are now home and through the two-week quarantine period for COVID-19, some are still stranded.

Margo Jones of Regina said she and her husband tried to book flights home from Mexico for April 8 because that was when her house would be available again. But those flights were cancelled and so was every other flight she has tried booking for weeks.

“We thought we were still going to be well within the reasonable time of getting home, not knowing that the airlines would start making cancellations and now we’re just stuck with that,” Jones explained.

While waiting on a new flight booked for June, Jones said she and her husband are making the best of it and she feels pretty safe at the condo complex four hours inland from Puerto Vallarta. She said many of their neighbours are in the same boat.

While some have managed to return to their home countries, many others can’t get flights home at all.

“Nobody is supposed to be out and about on the streets. If you are, the cops may come by and tell you to go home,” Jones said. “If you’re going between villages, they will stop you before you reach your destination and ask you why you are going into that village and if it’s not a good reason, you have to turn around and go back home.”

Jones noted they are still allowed to get groceries and have some food delivered. She is concerned about the Mexican workers who depend on the tourism industry to make a living.

“Whether it’s a storefront or whether they’re selling on the street or whatever, they count on our business to keep them going and for them, (restrictions) are devastating and there are many people out of work,” Jones explained.

While she wants to be home in Regina to be closer to grandchildren and family after the mandatory two-week quarantine period, Jones admitted her biggest fear is the risk of exposure on the journey back.

“We have been told by our (Canadian) government to go to Mexico City and then to Toronto and then home, but for us that’s putting us right in the middle of it. Airports and airplanes are known for being a petri dish and that’s what we don’t want to do, is get into that,” Jones said.

At this point her biggest fear is getting exposed to COVID-19 on the flights home.