I got it on a cruise ship this past July (symptoms literally showed up the night before disembarkation). I had lost my sense of smell and taste about 3 days later. I had congestion and was blowing my nose constantly.
I tried to taste something...anything. The only thing that had a smidgen of taste was honey. For smell testing, I literally put cologne practically up my nostrils, but to no avail. I was genuinely fearful that I may never regain those senses.
But it was about 5 days later when the taste buds returned along with smelling capabilities. I was overjoyed! I was on a cruise last week, but this time I had a vaccine taken about 10 days after my bout with it. This should/would give me some level of protection. I'm now on a holding pattern for a few more weeks as I need to wait at least 2 months before I should/could receive the latest vaccine for the variant(s).