Returning home amid crisis

Karen Heath, the town clerk/treasurer of Medicine Bow, was invited by her niece to take a dream vacation to Iceland flying out March 11.

"My niece's husband wanted to give her a great birthday present, so he bought tickets for her, me and two of her friends," Heath said. "I got to her place in Pennsylvania on March 10 and we flew out of Newark March 11 to Iceland."

Heath said her niece found an apartment for the week and had rented a car so they would not need to use public transportation. She said the group stayed in a suburb outside the capital of Reykjavik.

"We were doing our own thing, going to places like Thingvellir National Park with its beautiful waterfalls," Heath said. "It was also the place where the first parliament was held."

She said the group also went to several amazing museums.

"I could have spent the entire six days at the Perland Museum," Heath said. "I also loved visiting the Magic Ice where tables were made out of blocks of ice and you sat on sheepskins as you enjoyed a drink."

Heath did other tourist things such as visit a black sand beach and go to the area where the newest island had been born out of volcanos.

While enjoying the trip, she said the group started getting text messages from home that COVID-19 was starting to spread in the United States.

"We weren't really worried about it in Iceland when we first got there because the country only had 80 cases," Heath said. "Then, after being there a couple days, the number jumped to over 300. That was a bit shocking."

The group wasn't exposed to large crowds since they had their own transport and were staying in an apartment instead of a hotel. She said the restaurants they ate at were not busy and there was a lot of space between tables.

"Thursday night we heard about the large increase of cases, so we went to the American Embassy on Friday morning to get their advice on if we should leave early," Heath said. "They told us since we were leaving on Monday, staying the couple days would be okay as long as we were careful."

Heath said the locals were friendly, cheerful and not worried about the virus in general. The group shopped in stores and Heath said there were no signs of any hoarding going on.

The night before they were supposed to fly out, they were told the plane would be going to JFK in New York instead of Newark. She said as they left that morning, Iceland decreed that people should not gather in any larger groups than 10 and that flights were scaling back. Heath said she not only got out in time from Iceland but back in time for returning to the United States.

"When we got off the plane, we had to fill out forms about our contact information and they took our temperatures," Heath said. "There were over a dozen CDC (Center for Disease Control) people around. If you had a temperature, you would be whisked away to a quarantine room. All this showed me how serious it was getting from when I had left the week before."

She spent one more night in Pennsylvania before returning to the West via Denver.

"It was weird being at the Denver airport at around 6 to 7 p.m. and seeing a ghost town," Heath said. "It was eerie."

She grabbed a flight to Laramie and she said that flight was almost empty. Ironically the airline sat her next to one of the few other passengers in the plane.

"The stewardess told us we could sit apart if we wanted, so I told the woman next to me, that I would move so she could stretch out," Heath said. "I did it because I did just come from overseas and, honestly, I didn't know where she had been either."

Heath said, when departing the airport, she had been given a card that strongly suggested self-quarantining for 14 days. She has done so.

"The thing about all this going on here in the world, the United States and Wyoming, is to take the virus seriously, but don't panic," Heath said. "It is a matter of sitting tight, because I really believe if we do that, all will end well."