Day 0 - rules whilst travelling home

Spendless

In a few days we will be picking daughter and travelling companion up from their holiday. As neither is double jabbed and have visited an Amber country, I'm just checking about the rules for travelling home.

I suspect that they will both land starving hungry - budget airline and skint teenagers!. Do they need a 'car picnic' or is going through a maccys drive through ok?  I'm assuming a 'wee' stop at the services will be? 

I'm asking because when we dropped them off last week, we then endured an horrendous 7 hour journey home.  Meaning we had to stop for petrol, something to eat and to use the toilets twice, none of which had been anticipated. The journey should have been half that time. We were receiving pics from daughter having drinks round the pool whilst we were still on the motorway. I'd rather know and stick some snacks and water in the car in advance than fall foul of any rules

Etch

It looks pretty clear, for England: Quarantine and testing if you've been in an amber list country - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
"When you arrive in England, you must travel directly to the place you’re staying and not leave until 10 days have passed."
Snacks and water in the car would seem to be in order.

Sandtree

The rules are go straight to your place of quarantine and whilst there dont leave, isolate from others living there, stay in a room with open windows etc etc

However there is an exceptional circumstances carve out so if you think you're having a heart attack you can go to hospital and if no food service will delivery, you have no near by friends/family then you can go to the cornershop rather than starve for 10 days.

Ultimately it'll be between you and the judge to decide if the circumstances were exceptional enough to avoid the £1,000 fine each (assuming first offence) for calling into McDs rather than having brought food in the car... poorly managed diabetic may get away with it, healthy teens probably should be told to suck it up.

CKhalvashi

It is a legal requirement to go straight to the place of isolation with no stops along the way to protect others.

If they are that desperate for a McDonalds, you'll have to get them one before they are picked up, or they must not have one.

Surely if they are 'skint', they won't have the money for a McDs anyway?

RudolphHucker

CKhalvashi said:

It is a legal requirement to go straight to the place of isolation with no stops along the way to protect others.

If they are that desperate for a McDonalds, you'll have to get them one before they are picked up, or they must not have one.

Surely if they are 'skint', they won't have the money for a McDs anyway?

"How to travel to the place where you’re quarantining

When you arrive in England, go straight to the place you’re staying to quarantine. Only use public transport if you have no other option, and make sure you follow safer travel guidance for passengers.

Long journeys to your quarantine accommodation

If you have a long journey within the UK to arrive at the place where you’ll be quarantining, you may be able to stop overnight in accommodation where you can quarantine yourself from others before continuing your journey."

The rules allow use of public transport - which would mean transfers and breaks in the journey unless you happen to get a direct route from the arrival point to the final destination. They also allow for an overnight stop if it is a "long journey"  (which is not defined).

A toilet break would not be seen as a breach of the COVID rules, (but prohibition would be a breach of human rights), and a drive through to get food does not put anyone else at risk.

I think the skint kids would be treated to a Happy Meal by parents willing to pick up their daughter.

Pick your daughter up, travel safely and take all the breaks YOU need to arrive safely home.

CKhalvashi

RudolphHucker said:

CKhalvashi said:

It is a legal requirement to go straight to the place of isolation with no stops along the way to protect others.

If they are that desperate for a McDonalds, you'll have to get them one before they are picked up, or they must not have one.

Surely if they are 'skint', they won't have the money for a McDs anyway?

"How to travel to the place where you’re quarantining

When you arrive in England, go straight to the place you’re staying to quarantine. Only use public transport if you have no other option, and make sure you follow safer travel guidance for passengers.

Long journeys to your quarantine accommodation

If you have a long journey within the UK to arrive at the place where you’ll be quarantining, you may be able to stop overnight in accommodation where you can quarantine yourself from others before continuing your journey."

The rules allow use of public transport - which would mean transfers and breaks in the journey unless you happen to get a direct route from the arrival point to the final destination. They also allow for an overnight stop if it is a "long journey"  (which is not defined).

A toilet break would not be seen as a breach of the COVID rules, (but prohibition would be a breach of human rights), and a drive through to get food does not put anyone else at risk.

I think the skint kids would be treated to a Happy Meal by parents willing to pick up their daughter.

Pick your daughter up, travel safely and take all the breaks YOU need to arrive safely home.

The question here is how long reasonably is long?

It's recommended to take a break after 4 hours of driving, so a 4 hour car journey will be seen as reasonable. I don't believe a stop 15 minutes into the journey (as an example) will be seen as reasonable when this stop is for food and not fuel or a toilet break.

I also agree that this may cause discrepancies in public transport vs car users where facilities are in place for those waiting for their transport, but equally I don't see a reason why there is a justifiable need for anyone in the car already (meaning not subject to isolation) to not buy a £3 meal deal (or McDonalds if preferred) to be eaten on arrival, therefore negating the need to stop and allowing the OP's daughter to go straight to the place they are isolating.

You have therefore highlighted that the rules are exactly as I have said.

RudolphHucker

And YOU have misinterpreted what I said.

• The rules do not state anywhere that the journey to the quarantine destination must not include stops as you asserted.
• The OP stated that he incurred a 7 hour return journey, and therefore would be entitled to several stops as he is making a two way trip, even under YOUR definition of a reasonable journey.
  
• You don't think a 15 minute food break is reasonable during a 14 hour journey? What breaks do you get during a normal working day?
  
• A drive through means the person stays in the car and doesn't come into contact with anyone. If the person was legally using public transport he could be sat in a public area for hours waiting for connections.

Use some common sense, who is going to police every journey for every person travelling from every amber country to every  home?

superbigal

Is there a question in here about  who the "traveling companion"  is.
Depending on what this means surely they maybe should not even be in the OPs car ?
Doubt you can bring in theory any Tom !!!!!! and Harry back from the airport ?

apparently forum bots do not like word short for Richard.

sheramber

superbigal said:

Is there a question in here about  who the "traveling companion"  is.
Depending on what this means surely they maybe should not even be in the OPs car ?
Doubt you can bring in theory any Tom !!!!!! and Harry back from the airport ?

apparently forum bots do not like word short for Richard.

Why not.

 All restrictions have been lifted. No different to travelling on a bus or on a train.

No social distancing.

Up to each person if they want to wear a face mask, keep windows open. 

Spendless

Some interesting replies here.......!!!!

So to answer/fill in some background. No, we couldn't go and pick a MacDonalds up in advance. After last week's horrible 7 hour trip home for a journey that should have been around half that time, we didn't want to risk it happening again, so booked into a hotel overnight, which also had 24 hour parking that we paid for. We arrived late afternoon to take flight times into account and was just as well as daughter's plane was delayed and we left the car park 30 minutes before the 24 hours were up. Once we left the car park we couldn't return without paying for another lot of not cheap parking! So, driving out to get a maccys in advance, wasn't possible.

We were paying for daughter's meal home. I mean I did find about £2.10 in loose change in her bedroom, so she could have managed perhaps a drink and some chips with it herself.  If we'd been able to and not been followed home from the airport by someone who would watch us going through a fast food drive through and then have to let a Judge assess the situation in order to fine us

Our thoughts about staying overnight, just in case of the 10.5-11 hours driving time with not much rest on the same day turned out to be correct, as we had another 7 hour drive home despite going an alternative route. Last week's journey seemed to have been caused by sheer volume of traffic on the road. This week's was due to a RTA.

Travelling companion - I could have also worded as holiday companion and the reason for that was purely to be a bit more vague. I've been on this site since said daughter was a baby (which is why no reply anywhere to a question on this forum ever surprises me) but that means there's plenty of detail about me and sometimes I prefer to be a bit more vague and not put whether daughter was holidaying with her cousin/friend/workmate/boyfriend. Presumably there is no rules that says that daughter can holiday and share a room and maybe bed with someone but not get in the same car to drive home because as Sheramber points out restrictions have been lifted. 


So during the 7 hour trip home, we did indeed need to stop to use the toilets and I picked up hot food there that was eaten in the car and I also allowed daughter to stretch her legs because she piped up from the back that she needed to. This stirred up a memory from the year daughter was born. My MIL flew home after a holiday and the following day we attended a family wedding in a different part of the country  that we drove to. The hotel had double booked the reception and we were left standing around for several hours whilst it was dealt with and finally sat down to eat around 5 hours after the Church ceremony. MIL didn't get to the final course as she complained of feeling unwell and was driven the 2 hours home. By the following morning she had been admitted to hospital with a DVT. She survived but never had the health she had prior to that with limited mobility till she died 17 years later of an unrelated illness. We'd lived with MIL's  ill health so long and it had been overshadowed by her death from Cancer last year that I'd forgotten the circs of her going into hospital with DVT

So for anyone following this, take into account that if you are doing a plane flight followed by a car journey home, you need to also consider that you may be sitting cramped up for a long period of time and that there are associated risks.