Adapting More Than Ever: Anh and Jean-Benoît on Travel During the Pandemic
Digital nomads Anh and Jean-Benoît share the challenges of their year in limbo—from scrambling for housing to chronicling lockdown, and how their travels have changed in the age of COVID.
Anh and Jean-Benoît are a true globetrotting duo. Since 2016 they have ditched their former lives to turn the dream of perpetual travel into reality, chronicling their adventures on the Tourdumonde5continents blog.
What changed for you this past year of extraordinary upheaval?
Our early-2020 momentum stalled hard. We were in Mexico on our way to a China road trip… then our flights vanished and Italy locked down the same week we landed back in Europe hoping the situation would calm down. By the time Austria sealed its borders we had already secured transport and lodgings there in haste. By the time France ordered its lockdown we were effectively stateless—no home to return to—so we had 24 hours to organise emergency sub-letting near Paris. Understandably stressful, yet once it was in place we could continue working remotely and found the lockdown itself less disruptive given our decade-long telecommute habits.
The real pinch came with cabin fever: unable to stray beyond a one-kilometre radius after years of globe-trotting, the urge to break free grew fierce.
How did you keep the blog alive during lockdown—new angles, republished content, interviews?
Our usual cadence is already ambitious; confined at last with surplus time, we caught up on delayed travel journals, profiled gear and services we rely on, interviewed a friend stranded in Sri Lanka… and launched a lockdown diary, followed by a de-confinement log. The details felt so surreal that re-reading them years from now may feel like a bad dream recalled in relief.
What’s your take on the recovery of travel in the coming months and years?
We’d love to believe tourism tomorrow will be greener, fairer, kinder… yet we doubt the fabled ‘world after’. Once borders reopen we fear mass tourism will rush back with a vengeance. Already we see travelers flooding partial-open destinations like Mexico and flagrantly ignoring curfews; fake PCR certificates surface overnight. Selfish, short-term behaviour seems to be increasing rather than decreasing—an observation we find hard to sugar-coat.
One faint ray: countless companies have discovered that remote work actually functions. Poorly organised at first, yet functional. That realisation should fuel digital nomadism, a pre-existing movement that many more destinations now court with long-stay visas or subsidies. Although digital travel has its own flaws, the economic footprint is often deeper and kinder than flash tourism.
When borders stabilise, will you head back out—and if so, how?
We never really stopped. After lockdown we seized the chance to tour France—what a privilege to explore a country of our own without the crowds. In September, before Europe’s second wave, we slipped into Italy’s hushed coliseums and canals. By now we’re in Montenegro and plan to drift into Albania within weeks. What has altered is the sheer amount of adaptation required. Formerly we mapped itineraries months ahead; today we bank weeks, not weeks ahead. Whereas we once relied on trains and buses, we now lean toward individual transport and cling to local health edicts. Once we lingered 4–6 weeks per city; today we’re ‘very slow travelers’, clocking closer to three months per stop. We still crave Asia, where family is waiting—but the timeline remains anyone’s guess.
Any hidden-gem regions beckoning you once the dust settles?
The pandemic rerouted us to the Balkans, a discovery we wouldn’t have made otherwise. Now other off-the-beaten-track corners call—Central Asia first in mind—though nothing is booked yet.
Photo credit: Anh and Jean-Benoît, Tourdumonde5continents.