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It feels a bit premature to talk about travelling as we battle the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But if travel is on the cards for you, it is best to know where you are allowed to go.

South Africa’s passport ranks 57th on Henley Passport Index‘s latest report for the most desirable passports, which means, technically, we are allowed to visit 102 destinations visa-free.

However, at the beginning of this year, 120 countries imposed restrictions on South Africa, making us the most restricted travellers in the world, reports Business Insider SA.

This was due to concerns over emerging COVID-19 variants.

The most restricted title has since moved on to India, with our restricted country count dropping to 84, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA).

Furthermore, “countries with moderate restrictions on South African travellers, including mandatory quarantine periods have dropped by around 70%”, which means that a negative COVID-19 test certificate is required with 43 nations.

Many of our African neighbours, as well as a few countries in Central America, will welcome us with open(ish) arms, but a large portion of Europe, Asia, and both North and South America will absolutely not.

Sherpa, a collaborative information project, has a comprehensive map of all the places that South African travellers are restricted from and allowed to go to.

According to their map, at least 10 countries in Europe are open to fully vaccinated South African visitors:

• Switzerland
• Ukraine
• Moldova
• Romania
• Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Montenegro
• Lithuania
• Estonia
• Iceland
• Norway

Being fully vaccinated will mean you have to have completed your course of two shots of a multi-dose vaccine, like Pfizer, or a single jab, like Johnson & Johnson.

A traveller will also need to be approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) to be considered fully vaccinated.

If you’re all sorted on that front, you could be granted a COVID-19 passport and travel with relative ease in the countries that have green as go.

It is important to note that some of these countries may still need a traveller to present a negative COVID-19 test certificate. However, a fully vaccinated traveller may not need to quarantine then.

In terms of travellers being unvaccinated, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Ukraine will allow you in, so long as you take additional COVID-19 tests and get travel insurance, which is mandatory anyway.

Albania and North Macedonia are the only two European countries that won’t require anything, not even full vaccination status.

Unfortunately, regardless of our vaccination status, we cannot travel to the UK just yet as we are still very much on their red list (based on their “traffic light” travel system), the highest colour of restriction.

Since the UK is loosening up quite considerably, this could soon change as the “traffic light” travel system is updated every three weeks.

[sources:businessinsider&capetownetc]