Last year, two million visitors from North America visited the Emerald Isle.
That stunning figure – fully one-in-ten of all Americans who travelled to Europe on vacation made Ireland their destination — was the fruits of two decades of hard work by Tourism Ireland, the cross-border agency set up as part of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.
Fast forward to the summer of 2020, however, and, courtesy of our new lodger Covid-19, the total number of American holiday-makers in Ireland would hardly fill a Paddywagon tour bus.
For while there is no complete ban on travellers from the US travelling to Ireland — though that option is being mulled over in government corridors in Dublin — the necessity to quarantine for 14 days on arrival means only the bravest, long-stay vacationers are boarding the EI 104 from JFK to Dublin.
