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There have been cancellations and chaos on US airlines, Canada and Japan have been cracking down on Covid rule-breakers, but the UK is opening up to more and more vaccinated visitors.
Here’s what we learned in pandemic travel this week:
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Greece, including Athens, pictured, has been hit by a extreme heatwave and wildfires have broke out across the country.
US citizens have already been advised against travel to countries with more than 500 Covid cases per 100,000 residents in the past 28 days, which includes popular tourist spots such as the UK, Spain and Maldives.
Now the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has given 16 new destinations its top risk designation of “Level 4: Covid-19 Very High.”
That means US citizens should avoid travel to these places and, if they really must travel, they should be fully vaccinated. Check out the CDC’s full recommendations list here.
2. The UK is opening up inbound and outbound travel
courtesy Visit Britain
The UK has seen a staycation explosion during Covid-19, leaving some areas overwhelmed. There are still plenty of options though. Here are some of England's most beautiful locations:
courtesy Visit Britain
At 978 meters, Scafell Pike isn't only the highest mountain in England, it also offers the best views of the unspoiled
Wasdale Valley and Wastwater -- the deepest lake in England. On a clear day Scotland, Wales, Ireland and the Isle of Man can be seen from the hilltops.
courtesy Visit Britain
Windermere, 10.5 miles (17 kilometers) long and 219 feet (67 meters) deep, is England's largest lake. Part of the scenic Lake District National Park, its small cruise boats welcome more than 1.2 million visitors each year.
Lake Windermere, Lake District National Park, Cumbria
courtesy Visit Britain
The southern seaside town of Brighton has its own eccentric answer to the Taj Mahal. Built for King George IV, the 193-year-old
Royal Pavilion is now open to the public as a museum. It houses an ice rink from November to January each year.
courtesy Visit Britain
Standing only 13 kilometers from Stonehenge,
Salisbury Cathedral in Wiltshire is one of England's most beautiful churches. The structure, built between 1220 and 1258, has Britain's tallest spire -- 332 steps to the top of the tower -- and Europe's oldest working clock.
Courtesy Suzanne Plunkett
The rolling landscapes of the
Yorkshire Dales showcase stunning variety of features from waterfalls to caves to limestone pavements. Hikers can challenge themselves to the
Three Peaks Walks, a trek to summit a trio of tough climbs, covering 38.6 kilometers, within 12 hours.
courtesy Visit Britain/Rod Edwards
Let's face it -- England isn't the most sought-after beach destination. That said, some 58 beaches around England have been awarded the internationally recognized Blue Flag, recognizing cleanliness and good facilities. With colorful beach huts,
Minnis Bay (pictured) in the Kent village of Birchington-on-Sea, is one of them.
courtesy Visit Cornwall/Adam Gibbard
Port Isaac is a small scenic fishing village in the northern part of Cornwall. It's also the birthplace of
Fisherman's Friends, a singing group that specializes in sea shanties -- another reason to love the place.
courtesy Visit Britain/Adam Burton
Some rocks and fossils found in the
Jurassic Coast, covering southern England's Dorset and East Devon, are 185 million years old. It's England's first natural World Heritage Site. Durdle Door (pictured here) is an iconic natural limestone arch on the beach.
courtesy Visit Britain/Britain on View
Founded in 1753,
The British Museum was the world's first national public museum. Today, it's still easily one of the best galleries around the globe. It has a collection of eight million pieces -- only 1% of which is on display. The signature Grand Court was designed by Norman Foster and was opened in 2000.
courtesy Visit Britain/Welcome to Yorkshire
Sutton Bank is where the heather-clad
North York Moors give way to gorgeous views over the pancake-flat Vale of York. It's one of the three Dark Sky Discovery Sites in the area for star-gazing.
Matt Cardy/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images
With neo-classical temples, grottoes and bridges built around the lake, the 18th century
Stourhead estate is a perfect example of an English landscape garden.
courtesy Visit Britain/Adam Burton
The Needles are three isolated rocks (a forth needle-shaped rock, which gave the group its name, collapsed in 1764) in a line off the coast of the Isle of Wight. One of the best ways to see them is from a chairlift in the nearby Alum Bay.
courtesy Visit Britain
Hadrian's Wall spans 135 kilometers from Maryport in the west to Tyne and Wear in the east. The UNESCO World Heritage Site was built to keep tribal warriors out of the northern frontier of the ancient Roman Empire. In the picture is a section of the Roman wall near Housesteads Fort in Northumberland.
courtesy English Heritage
Yes, they're much smaller than everyone thinks they're going to be, but they're still the best known cluster of rocks in Britain. We can't be sure if
Stonehenge really was the
first Ikea-style flat pack, but the prehistoric monument never ceases to surprise. Last year, some more and larger stone monuments, dubbed "
Superhenge," were discovered less than three kilometers from the site.
courtesy Visit Britain
Corby Crags' landscape is so stunning that it was used as a backdrop of Middle Earth in the
"The Hobbit"
movie poster in 2012. Corby Crags lies in Edlingham, a small village with 196 residents.
courtesy www.visityork.org
At 3.4 kilometers, York has England's longest medieval
city wall. The well-preserved fortification makes a picturesque two-hour trail around the heritage city.
Dan Istitene/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images
With rolling green fields and charming villages, Cotswolds is the largest of the 38 designated Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty in England and Wales. Painswick (in the picture) is one of area's historic towns.
courtesy English Heritage
Legend says
Tintagel Castle, a medieval structure on a rugged coastline of North Cornwall, is the birthplace of King Arthur. Below the castle is Tintagel Beach with emerald water and Merlin's Cave, a hiding place for infant Arthur in poet Alfred Lord Tennyson's "Idylls of the King."
Matt Cardy/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images
The Somerset city of Bath was inscribed a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987. It's known for its
Roman baths -- the only place in England for a natural thermal spa -- and Georgian architecture.
courtesy Visit Britain
As the biggest gorge in Britain,
Cheddar Gorge is home to some of the country's most dramatic cliffs and rarest animals -- like ancient Soay sheep. It's listed as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
courtesy English Heritage
A sea fort constructed by Henry VIII in the 1540s,
St. Mawes Castle offered protection to the waterway of the River Fal until it surrendered to a land attack during the English Civil War. It's regarded as the best preserved fort built by Henry VIII.
Stu Forster/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images
The coolest bridge in England? Costing £22 million ($31.7 million), the pedestrian Gateshead Millennium Bridge connecting Newcastle and Gateshead across the River Tyne is the world's first tilting bridge, capable of leaning upwards to allow ships to navigate underneath. This website lists its
tilting schedule.
courtesy English Heritage
This beautiful hillside castle was built by King Henry II in the 1180s. In 2015 alone,
Dover Castle was featured in two TV and movie productions: "Avengers: Age of Ultron" and BBC's "Wolf Hall." In the cliffs underneath the castle lie a network of secret WWII tunnels and an underground hospital.
courtesy Visit Britain
Abbey Garden is a tropical-style paradise with plant species from more than 80 countries -- from Brazil to South Africa to Australia. The wild garden experiment began when Augustus Smith moved to and became the owner of
Tresco Island, 28 miles off the coast of southwestern Cornwall in 1834. The garden has continued to expand with the help of Smith's descendants.
courtesy Visit Britain/Britain on View
Top Withins (pictured here) is a ruined site on Haworth Moor. It's said that the wild moorland inspired Emily Bronte's "Wuthering Heights" when the Bronte sisters lived here.
courtesy English Heritage
Back in the 12th century, to visitors in mid-2016.
Rievaulx Abbey was one of the largest and wealthiest monasteries in England. A brand new museum, a shop and a tearoom will be open to visitors in mid-2016.
courtesy The Royal Parks
The gothic-style
Brompton Cemetery on Fulham Road is one of London's most famous cemeteries. The cemetery has appeared in multiple movies including Pierce Brosnan's first Bond outing "GoldenEye." It's also the home to the mysterious tombstone of Hannah Courtoys -- read
London's coolest gravestones to find out more.
Christopher Furlong/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images
An alien spaceship? Or a deep-sea creature? This futuristic landmark is the facade of a Selfridges department store in Birmingham. The building, covered in aluminum discs, is part of the city's beloved
Bullring shopping center.
Matt Cardy/Getty Images
Considered one of the prettiest villages in England,
Castle Combe welcomed a spark of interest from tourists after it was used as a filming location for Steven Spielberg's "War Horse" in 2011.
UK case numbers have fallen tremendously since England dropped nearly all Covid restrictions on July 19, but there were still close to 183,000 new cases in the past week.
However, the country has had a very successful vaccine rollout, with more than 58% of the population now fully vaccinated.
Wales is set to drop most restrictions on August 7 while Scotland will do the same on August 9. Northern Ireland – across the Irish Sea – has its own region-specific measures.
Fully jabbed travelers from the United States and EU are now allowed to travel into the UK quarantine-free – although of course the CDC warns US citizens against doing just this.
In terms of outbound travel, the UK updated its “green list” on Thursday, adding Austria, Germany, Latvia, Norway, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia to the list for quarantine-free travel. You can read more about that here.
3. US airlines – and their passengers and crew – have had a rough week
At the time of writing on Friday, Florida-based ultra-low-cost carrier Spirit Airlines had entered its fifth day of mass cancellations. It’s been canceling hundreds of flights each day since Sunday, which the airline blames on weather challenges, system outages and staffing shortages. American Airlines was also in a cancellation frenzy.
01:54 - Source: CNN
Frontier now backing crew who used tape to restrain unruly passenger
Denver-based ultra-low-cost carrier Frontier had problems of a different kind.
A passenger on a weekend flight from Philadelphia to Miami was restrained by cabin crew after he allegedly sexually assaulted two staff members and was verbally and physically abusive. The airline was criticized for initially suspending the flight attendants, before later voicing support for the crew.
Oded Balilty/AP
Elderly Israelis wait to receive their third shot of the Pfizer vaccine at a nursing home in Netanya in August.
Israel is facing a new wave of infections, with more than 21,000 new cases recorded in the past week. A government statement has told citizens to “stop shaking hands, stop embracing and kissing and avoid any gathering in a closed space that is not necessary.”
Last month, Israel completely prohibited people from coming there from Argentina, Belarus, Brazil, Cyprus, Georgia, Great Britain, India, Kyrgyzstan, Mexico, Russia, Spain, South Africa, Turkey and Uzbekistan unless they get special permission from Israeli authorities.
Cole Burston/Getty Images
Toronto Pearson International Airport pictured in April 2020.
Two travelers who arrived into Toronto from the United States in July were fined close to $20,000 each for noncompliance with entry requirements, according to the country’s Public Health Agency.
The visitors provided false information related to proof of vaccination and pre-departure tests and didn’t comply with requirements related to on-arrival testing and staying at government-approved accommodation, the agency said.
From August 9, fully vaccinated Americans will be allowed into the country for nonessential travel – but only if they comply with all government requirements.
6. Japan is naming and shaming rule-breakers
The Japanese government is also getting tough on those who contravene the rules.
On Monday, Japan publicly named three Japanese nationals who broke quarantine rules after returning from overseas, reported Reuters.
Japan requires all travelers from overseas, including Japanese citizens, to self-quarantine for two weeks.
Dallas County Sheriff's Office
William Jordan Carter is accused of lying about testing positive for Covid-19 to take time off.
William Jordan Carter, a 38-year-old firefighter from Dallas, was charged with theft after allegedly taking paid leave for nearly a month while lying about testing positive for Covid-19.
Bank records show Carter made several purchases during his time off, including nearly $1,400 at Kalahari Resort, a large indoor water park and resort in Round Rock, Texas.
After a “small number of positive cases” of Covid-19 were detected aboard a Carnival Cruise Line ship, a new fleetwide mask policy requiring all guests to wear masks in some indoor areas was implemented on Wednesday night, the cruise line said – two days ahead of schedule.
Carnival did not immediately say exactly how many positive cases had been detected aboard Carnival Vista, which departed out of Galveston, Texas.
9. More vaccine mandates have been introduced in the US and beyond
In the coming weeks, New York City will be rolling out a new policy requiring proof of vaccination to enter all restaurants, fitness centers and indoor entertainment venues.
“If you’re unvaccinated, unfortunately, you will not be able to participate in many things,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio on Tuesday.
Countries in Europe have introduced similar measures and incentives to try to get people vaccinated.
United Airlines is mandating Covid-19 vaccines for all employees, while Grant Shapps, the UK’s transport minister, said this week in an interview with the BBC that he thinks “full vaccination is going to be a feature for evermore, and probably all countries will require full vaccination for you to enter.”
Finally, a White House official confirmed to CNN on Wednesday that the Biden Administration is developing a plan to mandate vaccinations for almost all foreign visitors to the US.
Officials are still in the early phases of developing the plan and an announcement is not imminent.