Send in the tourists? Not gonna happen.

I've been down to the Cape - Wellfleet - a couple of times in the last month. Typically in June everything is pretty much opened up, but the tourist (and traffic) season is still not in full swing until this week. So it didn't seem all that odd. Other than the masks and the fact that until just last week, there was no indoor dining at all - and even that's pretty limited - so it was takeout all the way. 

Still, there were plenty of signs that all's not well, and that it's probably not going to get much weller any time soon. Empty parking lots at the motels. A few restaurants not yet open - or ever - at all. Fewer inflatables on the roofs of those places on Route 6 that sell all the crazy floats: slice of pizza, swan, Sponge Bob...

The Wellfleet Drive-In is open, but I'm not sure about all the mini-golfs.

The ice cream places are doing a good business, because what's a summer on the Cape without a scoop or two of Cranberry Bog or Ryder Beach Rubble.

From what I've seen, the shops are open. I only went in to Atlantic Spice, but there was a wait, as only a few people are allowed in at a time. 

But from what I read, the Cape will be hurting this year.

Sure, those with summer homes will be there - most already seem to be. And maybe those who rent for a week or two will still be renting for a week or two. Mostly. But eating out is such a big part of vacation, and with such limited seating available this year, I don't think a lot of people will bother. It's tough enough getting into some of these places when they're able to seat in their full capacity. Take out's fine - it sure beats cooking, and you're probably not going to make fried clams on your own - but it's not the same as sitting down and having someone wait on you.

Another big part of vacation is poking in shops. For a while there, when I was a kid, we spent a couple of weeks on the Cape, in Bass River, each summer in those years we didn't go to Chicago to visit family. Even as a kid with no money, there was always something you could afford in the Barefoot Trader. One year, for me, it was a bracelet with different colored stones. A family purchase was a hideous ceramic ashtray that was a pinky-tan (old Crayola Flesh color) foot. It was in the family room at our house well after anyone was smoking there. 

This is more of less what it looked like:

Classy!

There was also an Irish gift shop, and one year pious little me bought some rosary beads that looked like little brown teeth. Another year, my sister Kath and I got matching straw hats in Hyannis that featured plastic palm trees with a monkey climbing up the trunk. As I mentioned, we were a classy lot.

There are still plenty of cheapo souvenir and tee-shirt shops, but there are also plenty of very nice shops selling cool women's clothing, interesting crafts, nice gifts, and works of art (reasonable and pricey). Going to the Cape for me always means doing a bit of shopping (or at least browsing) in some lovely shops.

Fortunately, for food, there's takeout. And for many shops, there's on line. 

Still, there's no denying that some of the fun goes out of vacation when you can't go out to eat, when you can't do a little shopping. 

I don't suppose that the restaurants and shops will be doing a great business, but many will try to eke things out.

But there's no takeout, no online, for places that aren't rented out, for motels. 

Places that rely on seasonal tourism are just plain in for a tough year. You plan on the 80-20 rule, with 80% of your revenues coming in during 20% of the year. But you're running into the 20-20 rule instead. I'm guessing that a lot of places will be shuttering for good. And a lot of those who rely on a good season to see them through the winter will be hurtin' for certain. (We have not begun to see the devastation to the economy that's coming...)

But the Cape can rely on at least the business of those who spend the full summer there, and for the (however diminished) business that will come from those who will still be renting a place. There are still things to do, like go to the beach. Get lobster rolls and ice cream. Walk around P'town. 

It's not just the Cape, of course. Massachusetts overall does a ton of tourist business, and Boston does a lot of convention business. This coming weekend, Boston would typically be jammed with folks coming in for the Fourth of July Pops concert and fireworks extravaganza. This year, zip. 

COVID-19 is striking quite a blow, even if - because we've been such good, mask-wearing doobies - Massachusetts is gradually opening things up again.

It's got to be pretty much the same all over. The only hope for tourism may be that, thanks to our cretinous response to the pandemic, Europe won't be letting any of us in. So maybe the folks who were going to go to Paris will end up at the Cape. Or on Mackinac Island.  Or at Bear Lake. 

Bad as it is in most touristic places, it's got to be worse in Orlando. 

Few areas of the country rely on tourism more than Central Florida, which is home to Disney World, SeaWorld, Universal, Gatorland, Legoland, and a plethora of smaller attractions. An estimated 250,000 people work in the leisure and hospitality industries, accounting for 25 percent of jobs in the area, according to the trade organization Visit Orlando.

Most workers whose livelihoods depend on Orlando’s ability to attract tourists in large numbers have managed to get by as the amusement economy shut down around them — though for some it has been a struggle. (Source: Boston Globe)

No surprise there. Florida is reputed to have one of the worst (and stingiest) unemployment systems. Difficult to navigate through, slow to respond once you do - and supposedly designed to make it difficult for those needing help to get it. 

Recent weeks have brought a new kind of purgatory for tourism workers in the region. Will spiking coronavirus cases in Florida halt the reopening that was beginning to happen? Disney, for instance, has been calling back employees ahead of a limited return to operations on July 11.

“To Disney’s credit, they have done everything in their power to mitigate our safety concerns about returning to work,” said [Paul] Cox, who also serves as president of Disney World’s stagehand union. “People are mostly terrified that the company is going to stop the recalls. That would be a disaster. People are barely hanging on as it is, and unemployment benefits will end soon.” 

But even if Disney does end up opening in another couple of weeks, the question is if they open it, will they come.   

I'd guess that most folks who go to Orlando as tourists fly there. You going to get on a plane any time soon? 

And even if you are willing to get on a plane, are you willing to fly to Florida, where the coronavirus is running rampant. And given the rumors of how Florida is fudging their numbers, it's probably running a lot more rampant than they're letting on.

It's actually hard for me to believe that, even in the best of times, anyone would want to go to Florida during the summer. But I don't have little kids clamoring to see the Disney Princesses or take a ride on Space Mountain. 

And the not-so-Magic Kingdom has been shut down since March, so they missed out on the spring vacationers. 

This is all translating into an Orlando unemployment rate of 22.6% for May. (In Boston, it was 14.4%.)

Officials estimate that it will take as many as five years for the Orlando economy to recover from the pandemic. 

A mega corporation like Disney can probably suck up a bad year. Not so much all those they employ. And those who work at the other parks. And in the restaurants and bars that are having a hard time whether they're in a tourist center or not.

But it's worse for the businesses that rely on tourists. And those tourists coming back any time soon? I'm afraid that's not gonna happen.