Flying to Italy

Jo, do you have plane tickets lined up, or a flight being considered?

If “Italy” (or France, Germany, Spain, etc) were open you would find MAJOR articles on reliable news sources (CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC etc) AND 238 threads on this forum. So again, who are you hearing this from????? Let me guess, some unknown poster on some misc web forum....ignore it (and them).

Aa far as I've read, the only thing that's supposed to happen in March (March 5th) is a review/possible revise of the current restrictions.

https://it.usembassy.gov/covid-19-information/

Another source (although our Italian speakers probably can provide better):
https://www.thelocal.it/20210112/when-will-americans-be-allowed-to-travel-to-italy-again-update

It also appears that different rules can apply to different zones. There's a bit about that in this 2/18/2021 article:
https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/italy-travel-covid-19/index.html

Tall and short of it? I don't personally expect Americans to be able to travel The Boot for leisure anytime soon....although never say never!

Fight is just being considered.. Our first choice was June for our whole family of 7. No way that's going to happen. Sept was the next possible month. We do have refundable lodging booked but nothing else.

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We’ve reserved flights for 2 to Bologna, Italy, leaving the USA on September 21, hopefully arriving September 22, for a trip entirely in the Fall. Hope your trip can happen, and ours!

Indeed, at this moment Italy has opened restaurants and museums. Some other Europeans have gone there on vacation, despite having to produce negative PCR tests in order to re-enter their own counties afterwards. That's today; will the restaurants and museums still be open after the February vacation visitors leave? What effect will this have? Portugal had European visitors at Christmas time to take advantage of the open restaurants while they were closed in other countries. Afterwards, Portugal had the highest infection rate in the world. So who knows if Italy will be open at the end of March.

Skyscanner is currently saying passengers not allowed to enter Italy until 05 March 2021. So the travel news is not coming just from friends of friends..

This is the color tier based status of each region as of today 2/19/2021.

https://www.repubblica.it/cronaca/2021/02/19/news/covid_monitoraggio_colori_regioni_campania_emilia_molise_arancione-288258108/

Below is a list of what is allowed and what is not in each color tier. It’s in Italian so you might have to use Google translate if you don’t speak the language. But basically in an orange tier zone, unless there are proven health, work reasons, there is a curfew from 10pm to 5am. You cannot cross city limits or regional city limits. Restaurants are open for take out and home delivery only. Only essential stores are open (groceries and pharmacies. All museums and exhibits must stay closed.

In a red zone you cannot be out at all, except for necessary tasks (shopping, work, health reasons, walking dogs within 200m from home) and you need to download a self declaration stating the reasons to go out first.

Violations to these restrictions will entail a €280 fine (€560 after the first violation)

https://www.ilmeteo.it/notizie/coronavirus-zone-rossa-arancione-e-giallo-ecco-cosa-si-pu-fare-e-cosa-vietato-144617

Assuming you can get there, the choice is yours.

That is truly wishful thinking. We are back to orange again as of tomorrow. I had been hoping to visit friends in Florence (that would require leaving my region of Emilia Romagna). Now we say goodbye to yellow and back to staying in our comune.... your town.... not even the next town over the river. I can travel to Modena to work but not to Bologna to visit friends. I would be shocked if Americans were allowed in by the end of March especially since Easter is April 3rd and I am afraid that will call for stricter controls like Christmas. A bit negative I realize but back to cappuccino in styrofoam cups tomorrow.

At this pace it’s going to be a while before a significant percentage of the population is vaccinated, so I don’t expect things to open up before Fall.

Also I don’t know if at a certain point they will reopen travel only for people who have been vaccinated.

Back last October I re-booked an "Italy Coast to Coast" bike tour I had originally booked for June 2020, then re-booked for September, 2020, before cancelling completely. Fortunately I got everything fully refunded (including the flights, b/c flights got completely cancelled by United). Tour deposit credit (200 BP) carried forward, and it turned out the travel insurance turned into a credit as well.
I'm booked on flights for 9/14 (PDX->SFO->FRA->BLQ and return 10/2 FCO->FRA->SFO->PDX). Pre/post tour hotel rooms reserved with free cancellation.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed things will be open by fall. I'm watching Italy's infection rate and vaccination rate daily. Otherwise I'm going to end up with some United travel credits.