E18 EZ EE THE WASHINGTON POST.SUNDAY, AUGUST 2 , 2020
obstacles, a new one travelers
will have to grapple with is
whether it’s still in their best
interest.
Drew Binsky has perhaps the
most riding on his final coun-
tries: Saudi Arabia, Ecuador,
Venezuela, Jamaica, Palau and
Ghana. He was planning to film a
90-minute documentary with a
production team from Los Ange-
les about his experiences in all of
them. The 29-year-old, who pro-
duces short travel-related videos
to his social media channels, is
hoping to leverage his documen-
tary and social media fame into a
role as a TV travel host.
While Binksy is eager to re-
sume his quest as soon as possi-
ble (he’s eyeing spring 2021 as a
possibility), others, like Gina
Morello, a 49-year-old from Dal-
las, aren’t as sure. After years of
planning, she’s four countries
short and had been slated to
finish in June.
“You have this ethical chal-
lenge of, ‘Well, I can go to visit
this other country, but do I really
want to take up their resources,
especially if they’re having a dif-
ficult time?’ ” Morello said.
“ ‘Should I really go there in
absence of a [coronavirus] vac-
cine or rapid testing available?’
Those are the things going
through everyone’s head right
now.”
While Sebova thinks extreme
travel will become more niche in
a post-coronavirus world, she
doesn’t anticipate it stopping.
“There will still be people who
will try even if it is more chal-
lenging,” Sebova said. “That’s
part of the reason people do it,
because it isn’t easy, because not
everyone can do it. We enjoy that
challenge.”
[email protected]Bailey Berg is a freelance writer
based in Anchorage. Find her on
Twitter (@baileybergs) and
Instagram (@byebaileyberg).they were transiting through
London en route to what would
have been their 187th country
and debating whether it was
wise to go. “Luckily we didn’t
have to make that decision. It
was made for us,” Sebova said.
To reach Libya, they needed to
fly first to next-door Tunisia.
Right before they would have
departed, Tunisia enacted a 14-
day quarantine for all arrivals,
effectively closing the door on
Libya and sending them home to
Australia. By the time they’ll be
able to go again, their visas will
have expired, and they’ll have to
start the process over.
Like most other prolific coun-
try collectors, they said the most
challenging aspect of their pur-
suit is logistics, particularly jug-
gling visas (a process Hawthorne
called “unpredictable and
opaque”) and booking infre-
quent flights to rarely-traveled-
to countries. People with this
goal almost need to like planning
travel as much as they enjoy
partaking in it.
“It gets very challenging once
you get down to having only a
few [countries] left, because
there’s generally a reason why
you haven’t been there,” McCa-
ughey said. “Which ones are the
most difficult are constantly
changing. Angola was consid-
ered to be one of the most diffi-
cult because they weren’t issuing
tourist visas, but now they have
electronic passes, and it’s signifi-
cantly easier. On the other hand,
Iran and Pakistan have become
more challenging.”
Several of the least-visited
countries are planning to stay
closed indefinitely. Island na-
tions Kiribati (in the central Pa-
cific) and Comoros (off Africa’s
east coast in the Indian Ocean),
which are the second- and
eighth-least-visited countries,
are both closed until further no-
tice. While extreme travel has
always presented innumerablemoney back.
Cruise lines, which have
canceled sailings through the
end of September after the
extension of a federal no-sail
order, are promising refunds
for canceled cruises. Their
preferred compromise: a cruise
credit worth 25 percent more
than the amount of the original
ticket. If you say yes, you
receive it instantly. But it can
take 90 days or more to get
your money back.
“It’s a waiting game,” says
Lindsey Holmes, owner of
Kingdom Destinations, a travel
agency based in Hoschton, Ga.
Some of her clients have run
out of patience, Holmes says,
and asked about a credit card
chargeback, which happens
when a consumer asks the card
issuer to force a merchant to
return the money. That’s one
possible shortcut to a refund.
Most chain hotels have
flexible policies for handling
reservations canceled by the
hotel or the customer because
of the coronavirus. Smaller
hotels tend to offer either a
refund or a credit, according to
Silvana Frappier, owner of the
Virtuoso-affiliated North Star
Destinations, a travel agency.
“If you accept a credit, hotels
may offer extra benefits on top
of what you already receive,
like a guaranteed
complimentary upgrade to the
next room category,
complimentary airport
transfers or a VIP welcome
basket,” Frappier says.
But, by far, the most
irritating cancellations are
those of tours such as
O’Sullivan’s. Some tour
operators are refusing to offer
refunds, referring to the fine
print in their contracts. Others
have changed their refund
policies during the pandemic to
make it impossible to receive a
full refund.
The reason? Tour operators
have “force majeure” clauses
that give them the right to
withhold refunds and offer only
credit in situations that are not
under their control. They are
trying to be flexible by offering
up to 24 months of credit or the
ability to transfer the credit to
a family member, says Adrienne
Sasson, a travel adviser with
Rubinsohn Travel in
Jenkintown, Pa. But they’re less
likely to bend to a refund
request.
“It’s important to understand
the terms of contract and
cancellation policy before you
place a deposit for a trip,”
Sasson says.
Tour operators that do offer
refunds are sometimes adding
cancellation fees of several
SEE NAVIGATOR ON E19What happens if
your summer
vacation gets
canceled? That’s
not a theoretical
question for Ann
O’Sullivan, whose
late-summer
cruise from
Athens to
Barcelona
became a
casualty of covid-19 in May.
She got a quick refund,
right? Nope.
Princess Cruises offered her
a refund or a credit. She chose
the former, but almost three
months later, she’s still waiting
for her money.
She and her husband also
put a deposit on a tour to Spain
scheduled for late May. The
tour operator canceled the
couple’s trip in April and
offered only a credit.
“We would rather get the
money back,” says O’Sullivan, a
retired federal employee from
Andover, Mass. “But that won’t
happen.”
O’Sullivan had every reason
to be pessimistic. As
cancellations mount, travel
companies are doing
everything they can to hold on
to your money. If you don’t
know your rights, you could
end up with a worthless credit.
“When a vendor cancels and
doesn’t provide the service for
which they contracted, you
certainly have a right to a
refund,” says Mike Putman,
chief executive of Custom
Travel Solutions, a travel
technology company. He says
the standard response is an
offer of a future credit or a
refund. “Some vendors are
offering a credit worth 125
percent of what you originally
paid for future travel, which
may be more enticing than
simply getting your money
back,” he adds.
You should get a full and fast
refund for any travel product
that’s canceled. But travel
companies want to keep your
money, so they’re making it
easy to accept a credit and,
sometimes, exceedingly
difficult to get a refund.
For example, if an airline
cancels your flight, it owes you
a full refund under federal law.
If you paid by credit card, you
should receive the money in
seven business days. This also
applies to tickets booked
through travel agents or online
travel agencies. If you paid by
cash or check, federal law says
the refund must be made
within 20 business days.
But at a time when
governments are bailing out
the airlines, many passengers
are struggling to get theirA c anceled trip deserves
a refund. Expect to wait.
The
Navigator
CHRISTOPHER
ELLIOTTThis image of First Avenue in Manhattan was taken by Alex Babayev, 42.
First Avenue is a major thoroughfare in the Upper East Side, a historic
neighborhood that such wealthy families as the Astors, Rockefellers,
Roosevelts and Kennedys once called home. Mayor Bill de Blasio currently
resides here in Gracie Mansion. Before Mayor Fiorello H. LaGuardia
moved into the “People’s House” in 1942, the building contained the first
Museum of the City of New York. The cultural institution now lives on Fifth
Avenue in Harlem.While we’re all spending far more time at home than we’d like, the Tr avel section is inviting its
readers to submit photos of notable places or things they can see from their windows. Can
you spot a historic building or mountain range? Do you have a great view of a landmark, park
or main thoroughfare? None of the above? How about a Cooper’s hawk, a stunning sunset or
a spectacular azalea? We want to hear about those, too. We will feature selected images in
print — and our staff will supply some historical or cultural tidbits about your view.
Submit the view from your own window at wapo.st/outmywindow.ALEX BABAYEVOUT MY WINDOWEditor: Nicole Arthur • Deputy Editor: Elizabeth Chang • Art Director: J osé Luis Soto • Photo Editor: Haley Hamblin • Staff Writer: Andrea Sachs
- Editorial Assistant: Helen Carefoot • Travel Advertising: Ron Ulrich, 202-334-5289, [email protected] • To respond to one of our
articles: E mail [email protected], call 202-334-7750 or write us: Washington Post Tr avel section, 1301 K St. NW Washington, D.C. 200 71.
TRAVELThe coronavirus pandemic has disrupted travel domestically and around the world. You will find the latest developments on The Post’s live blog at http://www.washingtonpost.com/coronavirus/VERY HUNGRY NOMADStry. But in 2019 alone, at least 39
people set foot in their last coun-
try. They nearly double the 2018
number (and make up nearly 16
percent of the cumulative total).
Mitsidis credits three condi-
tions for rising interest in “coun-
try counting”: the increasingly
widespread openness of borders,
decreased costs of travel because
of greater infrastructure, and a
new wealth of networks and sup-
port for those keen on joining the
193er club.
Between January and early
March, nine people accom-
plished the feat, so it’s likely that
2020’s total would have been
greater than the preceding
year’s. However, it’s unlikely
more finishers will be added to
the list in 2020.
Sam Hawthorne, a 24-year-old
explorer from Britain, also
would have finished in April,
making him the youngest man to
ever pull off the round-the-world
triumph. For now, he’s staying in
Tonga.
When he was offered a repatri-
ation flight, he declined. His fi-
nal few countries are largely in
the Pacific, and he’d hoped a
travel bubble would open up
between the neighboring na-
tions. Now the odds that he’ll
defeat the current record holder
by the October deadline look
slim.
Traveling pair Rachel Davey (a
40-year-old from Australia) and
Martina Sebova (a 39-year-old
from Slovakia) are also compet-
ing for titles, though theirs are
less time sensitive. When they
wrap up, they’ll be the first wom-
en from their respective coun-
tries of birth to do the loop. For
them, helping to diversify a list
made up of predominantly
White, European men is what
drives them.
“Realizing that left us with a
bigger purpose: to inspire other
women travelers,” Sebova said,
adding that she hopes the one
takeaway others learn from their
story is that the denizens of the
world are largely good and that
it’s not as dangerous to travel
around the world as one might
think, even if you have two X
chromosomes.
At present, they’re missing
nine countries, though they in-
clude the U.N. observer states
(the Vatican, which they’ve been
to, and the Palestinian territo-
ries, which they have not) in
their count.
Australia, where Sebova and
Davey are currently based, has a
ban on its residents leaving the
country, even if other countries
open up. Sebova said they hope
to be able to finish their journey
in 2021.
But even when they are able to
leave, it will take months to re-
plan. It took six months alone to
get the paperwork approved and
the mandated local guides hired
for Libya, one of their few re-
maining nations. In early March,
COUNTRIES FROM E17
They’ve been nearly everywhere on Earth.
Now, their goal is suddenly out of reach.
COURTESY OF GINA MORELLOTOP: Rachel Davey
of Australia and
Martina Sebova of
Slovakia in Sudan
in December. They
are nine nations shy
of visiting every
country. ABOVE:
Gina Morello of
Dallas visits Russia
in March. She has
four countries left.“You have
this ethical
challenge of
... ‘ Do I really
want to take
up their
resources?’ ”
Gina Morello, who was
slated to finish in June