Today we fly CNS -> BNE -> LAX -> SFO and get to experience the joys of 3 international connections! John's extensive time playing role playing games (Fable and Oblivion) prepared us for today's journey. Imagine that we have a precious item (let's call it two boxes of wine), our quest is to get that wine from Cairns to San Francisco. In Cairns, we check our two backpacks through to SFO but carry on our small bags and 2 boxes of wine. At the international transfer checkpoint, we find out Quantas does not allow carry-on's heavier than 7 kg (1 box is 11 kg), so we have to check in the wine. But Customs has to visually see any items that we claim tax credits on, so the guard at the front desk sends us 3 levels down to Customs. There, they see the boxes, stamp our invoice and send us on our merry way. Quantas' front desk issues us bag tags and fragile stickers, and directs us to "fragile" item luggage. Our boxed are swabbed for bomb residue there and added to the airplane. Then we are free to enter the international area, where (woot!) we get 30% of our wine cost back in tax refunds and credits! Finally, yet *another* security checkpoint at the gate for liquids and patdowns where they completely disassemble your bag and check every pocket. The guard gave up on John's backpack after 15 minutes though, because it seemed bottomless, and she realized she would never be able to reassemble it again. In LAX, we retrieved our bags for Customs on this side and find that at least one bottle of Sauvignon Blanc has broken, soaking the packing materials and destroying the cardboard box. It takes five airline workers and 3 different lines to get us a plastic bag to contain the remains, because of course, we still have another flight! Ah well, there is.a silver lining to the story. At least six bottles (all the reds for sure) have survived to LAX, none of our other stuff is wet because the wine was packed all separate, we are back home safely stateside, and we cleared Customs without having to pay any duty on our 12 bottles of wine! Yay! Just a few more hours until we are home in Campbell... (Updated 12/23 with how we repackaged the damaged wine box. Only 1 bottle broken, still not sure how it happened though.)
Saturday, December 23, 2006
The international flight RPG
Today we fly CNS -> BNE -> LAX -> SFO and get to experience the joys of 3 international connections! John's extensive time playing role playing games (Fable and Oblivion) prepared us for today's journey. Imagine that we have a precious item (let's call it two boxes of wine), our quest is to get that wine from Cairns to San Francisco. In Cairns, we check our two backpacks through to SFO but carry on our small bags and 2 boxes of wine. At the international transfer checkpoint, we find out Quantas does not allow carry-on's heavier than 7 kg (1 box is 11 kg), so we have to check in the wine. But Customs has to visually see any items that we claim tax credits on, so the guard at the front desk sends us 3 levels down to Customs. There, they see the boxes, stamp our invoice and send us on our merry way. Quantas' front desk issues us bag tags and fragile stickers, and directs us to "fragile" item luggage. Our boxed are swabbed for bomb residue there and added to the airplane. Then we are free to enter the international area, where (woot!) we get 30% of our wine cost back in tax refunds and credits! Finally, yet *another* security checkpoint at the gate for liquids and patdowns where they completely disassemble your bag and check every pocket. The guard gave up on John's backpack after 15 minutes though, because it seemed bottomless, and she realized she would never be able to reassemble it again. In LAX, we retrieved our bags for Customs on this side and find that at least one bottle of Sauvignon Blanc has broken, soaking the packing materials and destroying the cardboard box. It takes five airline workers and 3 different lines to get us a plastic bag to contain the remains, because of course, we still have another flight! Ah well, there is.a silver lining to the story. At least six bottles (all the reds for sure) have survived to LAX, none of our other stuff is wet because the wine was packed all separate, we are back home safely stateside, and we cleared Customs without having to pay any duty on our 12 bottles of wine! Yay! Just a few more hours until we are home in Campbell... (Updated 12/23 with how we repackaged the damaged wine box. Only 1 bottle broken, still not sure how it happened though.)
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1 comment:
Welcome back to USA!
The wine will taste all the better after such challenges.
2-3 of your X'mas presents are experiencing similar handling delays. Please be a little patient.
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