What’s it like? Any restrictions on movement? Are restaurants open and wine producers receiving visitors? I know things can change quickly. At the time of posting this message almost 1,000 COVID-19 cases are reported in France.
Or just back, or planning to go in the next few weeks?
the embassy still says everything is free for movement but that there are extra checks for flights coming in from highly impacted areas. I am going in a month but have a friend going in 10 days. last night she told me she contacted her tour guides and hotel and they told her Beaune is still business as usual.
I know some schools in Alsace are closed for several weeks (as is true in parts of Switzerland), and I read the Louvre was closed (haven’t confirmed). Otherwise, I have not heard of any larger closings in France.
We are likely going to scrap our 2 weeks there in May. I had a week of appointments set in Champagne as part of the trip.
My wife and I were in Paris last week. Did not notice anything different than the last time I was there — 4 months ago. Restaurants were full; needed reservations, even mid week.
(Note: Louvre employee’s refused to open the Louvre after we left.)
At the moment it’s mostly business as usual. There have been some restrictions in some areas, with schools temporarily closing in Alsace and the Oise region, north of Paris (Chantilly area) and the odd football match off; in the wine world a Burgundy wine fair due to take place this weekend was cancelled, there are rumours that En Primeur might be postponed. So nothing remotely like the situation in Italy.
It’s probably only a question of time, of course.
I live in Bordeaux, school reopens after the scheduled break tomorrow. You wouldn’t really know there was an ‘issue’ except all the pharmacies have signs saying no masks or sanitiser available.
I had read that almost half of the reported cases in the country are in the Oise area.
I had also read the Louvre was closed, but have since read that it reopened?
The Louvre closed for several days at the insistence of the employees, but it reopened.
I am supposed to head there on March 27, but my French colleague (in Orleans) is not sure that things will not start to shut down as the number of cases increase. For France, I expect the worst is still ahead. And we have warnings that the U.S. State Department may revoke my permission to travel, although that has not happened yet.
I cancelled my travel plans for late April / early May. For anyone in good health without young children and/or around elderly parents, probably fine to go.
Our concern is that we get there, and then we either experience a quarantine and get held there, or our flights get muffed up and canceled. FWIW, we have not cancelled the trip yet but it’s just not looking good.
And, as a huge tennis fan, i just learned the BNP Paribas is cancelled. That’s a big deal, with multiple impacts to a lot of people. The event is just 2 hours from our house. Ironically, we were going to attend and spend some days there but the high lodging costs were too much and so we dumped the idea. This is a 2 week event, over 17 million in prize money…the event is toast.
Someone in the Coronavirus thread in the Travel section posted that there are 30-something cases in Beaune. (Don’t know if this is correct.) You might want to follow up with him. Beaune is about the size of one neighborhood in Seattle, i.e., a tiny fraction.
I was in Paris last week Feb 29-Mar 4 and everything was operating normally. The Louvre closed for a couple days but reopened as others have said. Customs process entering France and upon return to the US was normal as well; we weren’t even asked if we felt ill. British Airways cancelled a few flights, but no noticable disruptions to travel.
We were supposed to be in the Provence area in a little over two weeks, but we just canceled. We were worried about the same thing as Frank. Possibly being stuck there or quarantined. We are considering a Champagne, Chablis, Burgundy trip in the fall, instead.
No. All travel postponed.
The current situation is that the government is preparing to raise the level of their grading of the situation from level 2 to level 3, probably in the next two or three days, meaning that they consider the virus to be present in most of the country rather than a few regions. When this change takes place, more schools will be closed and some public transport services will be affected. All meetings of more than 1 000 people have already been banned, so I imagine that puts paid to EP (not that anyone cares).
Basically the thing seems now to be spreading fast and it looks inevitable that there will be increased disruptions, so it would probably be wise to postpone any trips. If you do decide to brave the bug, I shall be quarantining myself in my cellar, with my corkscrew. You’re all welcome to join me.
We were supposed to leave for Alsace on Wednesday, but are cancelling due to concerns others have noted: getting stuck in a quarantine or lockdown on one end of the trip or the other (we’re from Seattle so who knows what will happen here in the coming weeks). Also it sounds like most museums and cultural sites in the region are closed, so there would be much less to do then we had planned on.
Also considerate to those not from Seattle…that you don’t spread the mess from King County…
This is all a two-way street/ contamination.
We don’t really know much about its spread yet, given the lack of testing/ results after all this time. But, I’d be more scared to visit Pike’s Market now than the Louvre.