Until Ireland re-opened to non-essential travel last week, the last time I had seen my brother was a year and a half ago. My parents, 21 months. My 98-year-old grandmother, over two years. They all live in or close to Paris, which was tantalisingly close. I have lived in places as far-flung as Kinshasa and never stayed away so long. It was time to catch up.

Over the past week, I’ve done what we used to take for granted: Catch a flight; visit loved ones overseas; enjoy a meal out or a museum in a different city, whether exotic or familiar. This is the article I would never have thought to be of interest – my travelogue of a common city break with a boring low-cost airline.

July 13: Booking day

I’m increasingly confident that the re-opening date of July 19 is here to stay. The EU digital certificate seems on track. From years of experience covering the Common Agricultural Policy, I know the European Commission is just about the best organisation in the world when it comes to rolling out cross-border IT-based bureaucratic behemoths. In successive interviews, the minister in charge of implementing the system in Ireland, Ossian Smyth, gives me the reassuring impression that he actually understands how this is going to work.

I begin to browse for flights tentatively, expecting low availability and high prices. The opposite turns out to be true. While my usual carrier, Transavia, has not yet come back to Dublin, Ryanair, Air France and Aer Lingus all have plenty of flights to Paris.

Ryanair’s fares are exceptionally low. Without any luggage, I could have got there and back for €16. With a cabin bag, it’s just €60. I go for it. My flight is booked for July 23.

July 20: Digital cert day

I was vaccinated by my GP and so I know my EU digital certificate will come by post. Getting a digital document in paper form sounds preposterous, but it turns out not to be. More on this later. 

More importantly, it comes on time. An envelope from Revenue lands three days before my departure, containing the precious QR code. Once again, the state is harnessing the administrative power of the tax authority to tackle the pandemic. Or maybe it’s just a ploy to make us happy to pay our taxes. If so, I fall for it.

I download the French government’s Covid-19 app, called TousAntiCovid. Based on my phone’s Irish settings, it automatically appears in English. Just like Ireland’s Covid Tracker app, it now has a QR code scanning function to acquire data about the user’s immune status. 

I’m not sure it’s going to work across borders, but I chance scanning my Irish-issued EU digital certificate into the French app. I’m instantly recognised as vaccinated and issued a digital “Passe sanitaire”, the domestic cert required to access an increasing number of venues and services in France. A celebratory shower of confetti pours across the screen.

In addition, I decide to bring a photocopy of my original paper EU cert, which itself stays safely filed at home. As a triple lock, I also scan a copy of it into cloud storage where I can access it if I lose both my phone and my photocopy.

July 21: Check-in day

The main challenge to putting together the documents required to check in and travel is information overload. Ryanair is bombarding me with emails in both French and English (or a mixture of both) urging me to check the latest rules for my destination, but they don’t tell me what they actually are.

In retrospect, the clearest and most up-to-date resource is the Re-open EU website (yes, those Brussels bureaucrats again). French official information is relatively clear as well but spread over multiple government agencies’ websites.

It turns out the current requirement to enter France is to present the EU digital certificate along with a signed declaration that I have no Covid-19 symptoms, nor am I a close contact. I print out the declaration form and sign it.

The Ryanair app allows me to photograph and store those documents along with my boarding pass when I check in online. I’ve heard Aer Lingus does the same. 

In preparation for re-entry into Ireland, I also need to fill out the online Passenger locator form, which sends me an email confirmation I’m told must be available for inspection. 

July 22: Packing day

There are two new items in my luggage for this trip. One is a pack of FFP2 face masks, the intermediary standard between basic ones and Covid ward-grade professional gear. I got them on the advice of a hospital medic, who also suggested shaving off my beard as her male colleagues have done since the start of the pandemic to ensure a tight air seal and full filtration through the mask.

Off with my carefully styled facial hair.

My other new travel accessory is an antigen test. I know it won’t necessarily detect the presence of Covid-19 in my body, but I understand it is good at picking up when infected people are at their most contagious. I’m going to visit my pregnant sister-in-law, my parents in their late 60s and 70s and my granny’s nursing home, all vaccinated but still – no harm in an extra layer of precaution.

The pharmacist tells me it works just like a pregnancy test, which doesn’t mean much to me but it might to you.

July 23: Departure day

I put on the FFP2 mask before leaving the house and won’t take it off until I reach my brother’s home late at night, except for a snack at the airport. Thankfully, it’s reasonably light and comfortable even in a heatwave.

Dublin airport is busy. I don’t know if this results from a surge in the number of people travelling or reduced capacity, but the wait for security checks is long for a weeknight. This means no social distancing in the low-ceilinged meandering queues before the X-ray machines, probably the most crowded-in environment I’ve been in since the pandemic started. I tell myself anyone in the queue has to be vaccinated or tested, and nearly everyone is wearing their mask correctly. 

Disappointingly, among the handful of people wearing no or partial face coverings through the whole experience, three are employees of the airport, a shop and a restaurant. The restaurant where I stop for a pint and a sandwich before boarding is especially lax. My table is cleared of the previous diners’ leftovers long after I sit down, and even then, staff don’t clean the table itself. 

Boarding works as usual, except gate staff also check for EU digital certificates. I open mine in the Ryanair app and they make sure that I have one, but don’t scan it or otherwise verify whether it is valid, and they’re struggling to see it on the phone’s screen. That’s when I begin to understand that the paper copy might work better.

My flight is only one-third full, ensuring plenty of distance between passengers.

The immigration check after arriving at Beauvais airport includes verification of the (paper) EU digital certificate, but only looking for a name match on the document without scanning the QR code. I don’t want to give anybody ideas, but I could just have photoshopped it together. Nobody ever asked for the signed declaration.

Then it’s on to the shuttle bus into Paris and a metro ride for the final stretch, all operating at full capacity. Constant reminders to wear a mask are the only sign of the pandemic.

Last before going to bed is the antigen test. Ramming a cotton swab up your nose is not the most pleasant experience, but it only lasts a few seconds. Instructions are somewhat convoluted yet what you have to do is actually quite simple, adding a few drops of liquid to the swab and placing it into the test container. Fifteen minutes later, the clearly legible result is negative.

July 24: Tourism day

Saturday is a blissfully sunny day when I stroll around Paris with my brother and sister-in-law. The city is open for business. As usual in late July, most Parisians are away on holidays. The tourists who usually take their place are still in low numbers.

We have lunch in a restaurant operating as normal. Once the outdoor terrasse where we are seated fills up, staff offer tables inside as well. We’re glad we’re outside because none of them wear masks. 

They don’t keep a record of our contact details because we’re outside, but that’s a requirement for indoor dining or drinking. Alternatively, French bars and restaurants can generate a QR code to display on their front door and let patrons scan it on the way in with the TousAntiCovid app, which will alert them anonymously if they were on infected premises during an outbreak. 

Legislation passed while I’m in France will make the Passe sanitaire compulsory to access all bars and restaurants in the coming weeks, including their outdoor areas. The document proving vaccination, recovery from Covid-19 or a recent test will also become a condition to board an inter-city train or a domestic flight and to enter a hospital, where staff will now face sanctions if they refuse the jab.

Vaccine hesitancy has been strong in France and there are protests here as parliament debates the legislation during my stay. The country has just passed the milestone of half of adults fully vaccinated, compared with the 70 per cent now achieved in Ireland. This leaves lots of space for the Delta variant to spread. During my stay, the daily number of new cases shoots up to over 20,000, ten times as many as recorded in early July.

The announcement of the new bar and restaurant obligation, however, has convinced many hesitant French citizens. In recent days, demand at vaccination centres has exploded here.

The Passe sanitaire is already required to access other public spaces with more than 50 in attendance. In the afternoon, I visit a photography exhibition in a museum. The security guard uses TousAntiCovid on his smartphone to scan mine and gets a confirmation that my name is associated with a valid certificate. I’m in – seamless.

Not only is everyone inside dutifully wearing a mask, but knowing that they are all vaccinated or otherwise checked for immune status makes the whole experience a lot more relaxed and enjoyable.

The perks of being an EU citizen are obvious. In a pharmacy, I overhear an American family enquiring how they can have their US-administered vaccines recognised in France. The pharmacist directs them to the local health authorities but does not give them much hope. Unless they find a way of converting their jab into a Passe sanitaire, no Mona Lisa for them.

In the pharmacy, I also buy more home-use antigen tests. I will test myself after travelling back to reduce the risk of bringing the virus home. While a single test cost me €12.90 in Ireland, I get a pack of five for €26 here. I also stock up on my regular prescription medicine, which is astonishingly cheaper in France. But that’s a topic for another article.

July 25: Family day

My granny has given the best expert assessment of the pandemic I have heard to date. She has described it as “une tuile”, which translates roughly as “a spot of bother”. I suppose once you’ve survived nazi air raids, everything is relative.

Since I last saw her, she has moved into a nursing home. The visit presents the added challenge that she currently has shingles, so definitely no hugs either way. Still, we’re delighted to see each other again and catch up. 

The visit gives her enough energy that when it’s time to leave, she decides to walk me to the exit, leaving her room for the first time since contracting shingles. She forgets to put on her mask, though, and gets caught by the patrol in a corridor. 

The kindness of the staff member who spots her and immediately offers to go get her mask is heart-warming. She’s in good hands here.

July 26: Cinema day

I’ve been to the cinema in Ireland a few times since they re-opened, so this is a good opportunity for a direct comparison. My parents and I go see La Fine Fleur (lovely film, in case it’s ever released in Ireland).

As mentioned above, the Passe sanitaire is compulsory where capacity exceeds 50 people. The small cinema we go to has chosen to limit attendance below this number and, as a result, there are no checks going in. We’re simply asked to wear a mask at all times.

I read in local media that since the Passe sanitaire obligation was extended to cinemas with 50 or more customers on July 21, their ticket sales have dropped by half. This one has chosen to maintain the attendance limit instead.

Seating is free too, which means we are much closer together than in current Irish cinemas, where a huge buffer is cleared around your assigned seats.

Neither feels ideal. As cases of the Delta variant multiply, I’ve been less and less comfortable sitting indoors for two hours with people of mixed immune status. I hope cinemas will soon check proof of vaccination just like the museum I enjoyed much more confidently two days earlier.

So do friends of my parents’ we bump into after the film. One of them is fed up with the conspiracy theories fuelling vaccine hesitancy. He makes it clear that he doesn’t mind seeing the virus take those who think that way out of circulation. Not for the first time, I’m aware that the pandemic has made worse what was already a very divided French society.

July 27: Return day

I leave Paris on the same crowded metro and bus rides I came on. Beauvais airport is busy too.

The security staff at the first checkpoint into the departures area can’t see sufficient details on the scanned EU digital cert in my phone, and the paper copy proves useful again. 

Unlike Ireland, France has a police check to leave the country to a non-Schengen destination. The officer looks at the same documents again and scans my ID, but not my vaccine cert.

The flight back carries a lot more passengers than the one out to Paris just four days earlier. It is at least half full and there are many French tourists heading for holidays in Ireland.

After landing in Dublin, the friendly immigration officer addresses me in a mixture of French and English. This is the language we speak at home and I like it. Each officer is surrounded by four walls of perspex and doesn’t wear a mask.

He checks my ID and asks me to remove my mask briefly to match my face to the photo. Then he checks my EU digital cert with a smartphone and gets a valid match for my name. This is the first and only time in the entire trip that a combined verification of my identity and vaccine status has taken place. 

I’m not asked for the passenger locator form confirmation email, but maybe the officer can see it – I don’t know. In any case, I do get an SMS the next day telling me what to do if I have symptoms of Covid-19 in Ireland.

Despite the extra steps, there is hardly any waiting time for immigration.

It’s after 11pm when I leave Dublin airport and I’m lucky to catch a rare 16 bus into town – direct airport services have not yet resumed. We’re stuck for a few minutes as a proper traffic jam clogs up the exit road despite the late hour.

This can only mean one thing: Travel is back. And it feels good.