New England, Chile and Australia are my big trips. All to destinations where I can’t just wave my EHIC card to get free medical treatment.
A few months ago I tried a rather large number of specialist insurers. Many who’d got their names inserted to MacMillan and Cancer Research UK web sites. None of them will provide cover for any illness related to my cancer. They know what a horrendous risk I am to insure.
In other words, any serious deterioration in my condition that leads to a stay in hospital overseas could very quickly decimate my redundancy money.
My instruction to Chris as he travels with me on those first two trips is to be prepared to leave me overseas if my condition deteriorates. Get home. Make any arrangements necessary from afar. He’s got my sister’s phone number. He’s got my oncologist’s number. He’s a second cardholder on two of my credit cards and he’s got a decent number of airmiles in his own name too.
Yesterday morning I started to go through the cheerful routine of how to get home at short notice. Alas, option one of rescheduling existing Avios paid for flights failed because the BA web site was down – in normal circumstances this can be done by phone for a small fee. Option two of buy a new Avios flight failed for the same reason. But it’s definitely the cheapest way to get home. Alas, the vagueries of availability of reward seats on flights might make finding a suitable flight a challenge. Aim A is get to Manchester. But he might find Heathrow has reward seat availability whereas Manchester doesn’t.
Buy a fare for cash. Or rather on my credit card if I’m still living. But a single is usually more expensive than a return in the unintelligible world of transatlantic airline pricing. Consider flying Norweigan or Icelandic as these guys do one way fares for half the price of a return. But the poor lad might not have his price sensitive head on in such circumstances, let alone the knowledge of utilising skyscanner to identify cheapest fares.
There is a risk that my health will fail me and I’ll drop my boy in it big time. I’ve provided him a long list of options for him to follow. That clear instruction to get home without me if necessary stands. And yes, I feel a little guilty for the possibility of putting him in that position.
But I’m going to travel for as long as I can.
Seeing the World 
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