With Covid cases in our next destination of Medellín, Colombia spiking in a third wave and ICU capacity exceeding 100% at many of the hospitals, we decided to hop back to the US between our stay in Mérida and Medellín to get vaccinated. More and more countries are opening to US citizens that are fully vaccinated, and some are opening only to those that are vaccinated. This includes Mongolia where we plan to be in July. Since you generally aren’t considered “fully-vaccinated” until two weeks after your final shot, we had to get the vaccine ball rolling to be sure we’ll be admitted into the country when we’re scheduled to arrive at the end of June.

Although our legal residence of Florida has allowed anyone sixteen and older to get vaccinated for some time now, there was a practical limitation for us heading back to get one. Primarily, it was impossible to book an appointment anywhere more than about a week in advance. Of course, buying a plane ticket a week in advance of your trip is pretty expensive. Fortunately, when we looked for appointments near my dad’s home in the panhandle, appointments were already plentiful. So we felt comfortable booking our flights a few weeks ago with the expectation that we’d be able to secure appointments shortly before we depart. Luckily, we were successful! Bonus, we get to see my dad!

We were originally hopeful that we could nab the J&J one-and-done vaccine, but then they paused distribution. So it’s two-shot Moderna series for us. We had a flight credit on Copa Air and used it to book a quick one-night trip to Miami from Colombia next month, since connections to my dad’s are much more expensive and difficult from Colombia. Even if we can’t secure our second shot appointment when we get our first shot, it seems like appointments are becoming easier to get, even in the denser areas.

Cross your fingers for us to have only mild or no side effects!