I wouldn't consider rewriting in a complete different language, without any support for idiomatic Python code a "bit more transition pain".
GIL only exists on CPython, there are other implementations.
GIL only exists on CPython, there are other implementations.
It's also quite an issue for COTS software - sometimes to jump forwards and clean up APIs they have to do a huge refactor, sometime even a re-write of the API. If this is troublesome enough, it's worth taking the time to look into the competition.