Pet Travel Story: Jaja and Leia’s Move to the UK
Incredible Experiences: Two Globetrotting Dogs
Jaja and Leia are sisters, both 10 years old, and of mixed shepherd dog breed originally from Turkey, the first country I lived in overseas with my husband.
My husband brought them home when they were pups on the day they were about to be taken away from his factory grounds by the local municipal who were rounding up strays.
Since then, they've moved with us to Honduras, Hong Kong, Bangladesh, Costa Rica and now UK! Though they're seasoned travelers, we still dread the day when we have to pull out the carton boxes for packing.....the reckoning of what's coming and the resigned look in their eyes says it all.
The difference with this move is for the very first time, we're using the service of a door-to-door pet agent. For every single relocation in the past, I've personally handled all related paperwork, from the vaccinations to the relevant country's import and export documents, using agents only for certain route of the journey. The reason why we used PetRelocation this time was due to the trauma my husband and I experienced at Los Angeles airport when we had to fly with the doggies from Bangladesh to Costa Rica.
We were patting each other on the back after our first two flights went without a hitch, from Bangladesh to Hong Kong (overnight to rest the doggies), and then from Hong Kong to Los Angeles. During our last leg from Los Angeles to Costa Rica whilst we were on board, no one would tell us if our doggies were in the hold!
After threatening to walk out of the plane, they finally told us that the doggies are still on the ground and have not been loaded due to missing paperwork! The airline then had to reopen the cabin door, remove our luggage and we then made a few frantic calls to try and retrieve our doggies from the cargo building.
This all happened at 2 a.m. at the Los Angeles airport, us standing at the airport with two large dogs and crates, four suitcases, no taxis and no one in sight! To cut the long story short, after finding a taxi kind enough to accept the doggies we then hopped from hotel to hotel to search for a pet-friendly hotel. The following day was equally stressful because then we had to rebook all our flights and cargo space for the girls!
When we heard we were relocating to UK and knowing the quarantine laws have changed effective Jan 1, 2012, we both decided that we definitely cannot afford to have a repeat of our last experience and we wanted to make sure that everything goes smoothly this time. Not even the snow at Heathrow airport posed a problem....just unbelievable!
The girls went on their first walk in the woods today. We're introducing them to their walks slowly to acclimate them to the freezing weather in UK now. How I wished I could've read their mind when they saw snow since the last time they saw snow was almost 10 years ago in Turkey.
Everyone involved from Costa Rica to Houston to London were wonderfully attentive and professional. It makes such a huge difference not to worry about the "what ifs"! We'd like to thank Andreas and Dr Jose in Costa Rica and Jayne in London, and last but not least dear Ashley and Sarah. Your prompt replies by email and more importantly how you never hesitated to pick up the phone to call really makes all the difference. Thank you for bringing our girls home safe and sound.
Thank you,
PC
Pet Transport Details:
Name: PC
Pets' Names: Jaja and Leia
From: San Jose, Costa Rica
To: London, UK