Part one of a three-part series on moving people, pets, and possessions to a new country.
Let’s talk about the process of getting here. I mean, physically getting people, pets, and possessions across a continent and an ocean.
Most folks seem to give very little thought to this part, figuring they will “buy a plane ticket and go.” Go where? When? How will you get from the airport to your destination? When making an international move, you may have had help arranging a home – do you even know how to get there from the airport? Or from anywhere? There are a hundred questions that don’t seem to occur to folks until much later than they ought. For us, it looked like this:
Deciding when to travel
When we travel for vacation, we pick a date, book a hotel and buy a plane ticket. But when you’re travelling to stay, it’s not that simple.
Our visa application appointment was in January. I spent months in expat forums – both general and those specific to our destination (city and country) and one thing I paid close attention to was visa processing times.
These vary wildly depending on which consulate, time of year, and world events. The autumn before we left, Portugal made changes to its expat tax regime. A flood of visa applications ensued, all trying to get in ‘under the wire’ before the law changed on Jan 1. I found a web site created by an expat that reported visa processing times and watched it carefully.
Visa processing itself can be highly variable depending on which person processes your stuff. In our case, some-but-not-all reported being required to have a plane ticket already purchased at application time. I did all my flight research early, but waited until we actually made it into the visa processor’s offices before buying. Processing time at that point was hovering around 45 days – so I bought plane tickets 60 days out, and had the receipt just in time to provide it when asked.
It’s worth the extra $100 or so (on most airlines) to get a changeable or refundable ticket. If visa processing doesn’t happen in your predicted time frame, you need to be able to change your travel dates. That also means ensuring you have someplace to stay. Whether that’s staying in your current home longer than planned, staying with family, or identifying a short term rental, be prepared to be where you’re at for up to 45 days longer than you thought. In most cases, you have to have already established a home in your destination country in order to get the visa, so presumably it will be there waiting for you whenever you arrive, so it’s just the departure country you’ll be worried about.
Relocating for work and have a hard deadline? Be prepared to split up! You can travel on a tourist visa for a short time – but will need to plan to fly back once your visa is in place. You’ll almost certainly need to enter the country using that visa in order to meet its requirements. If you’re travelling to a country in the Schengen zone, it’s not enough to leave the country – you have to leave the Schengen zone entirely and then re-enter. There’s usually a time limit, a specific number of days that your visa is valid for entry and you’ll need to meet that.
Meantime, of course, the rest of the family is still in the “old country” waiting for visas. Are you prepared to support two households? If you’re solo, is there someone on that “old” end who can manage details for you, be there for movers to pick up your stuff, and do whatever needs done that you couldn’t do while also still living there, like turning off the utilities that you needed to have running until you left? Does that person have a power of attorney to handle items for you? Is it notarized? (Even if your state doesn’t require that, some organizations are very picky – many banks, for example, will push back.) If you’re a family and split up, remember that your left-behind spouse will be managing kids, travel, and a move on their own, and ensure there are supports in place.
Deciding how to travel
Our trip from Bremerton, WA, USA to Setubal, Portugal consisted of four distinct journeys.
Getting to the departure terminal
We booked an early morning flight out of Seattle, which meant our first journey was to get us, our dog, and our luggage to SeaTac. Knowing this would be a lot to manage, we opted to book a hotel room the night before – airport shuttle, or a block on foot meant fewer worries about traffic or other “external factors” making us late.
But – it’s an international move, which meant lots more luggage than either of us “can’t you fit it all in a carryon” types would normally carry (more on that when we get to the “possessions” section). Our local shuttle service wouldn’t carry quite that much and we thought we’d have to hire a ground transport of some sort but we got a lucky break instead. A friend inquired about buying our truck for their recently-licensed son and a plan evolved: we drove the truck to the hotel, and they came out to have a farewell dinner with us at a nearby restaurant. We were able to keep the truck til the last minute, and they were able to acquire a reliably-maintained vehicle they were confident was safe for their son. Bonus: being there and getting to hand him the keys when his folks told him it was now his truck.
Two “life saver” purchases made this process much easier. First, we bought new luggage. Our old luggage was fine and would have done the job, but I found Tach (as in “attach”) and it was well worth the cost of two 3-piece sets!
These suitcases have a “keyhole” design that allows you to nest their flat sides into each other – just a little, enough to keep them aligned in a straight “stack” – and a strong Velcro connection system. They say you can connect 6-9 units, but we kept it to 3 or 4. One person could easily maneuver both sets through the airport. The hardest part was attaching/detaching (that Velcro is strong and was often a two-handed leverage-based pull to detach). Bonus: attach two carryons together for trudging around the airport, and attach the other four together with largest units on the outside. The two medium units then create a flat-topped “shelf” between them, which becomes a handy place to drop your coat or set your coffee cup.
The second item was a collapsible canvas wagon, which helped us maneuver one oversized luggage piece with relative ease. Most wagons have a pull handle (think “little red wagon”) but I chose one which could be configured for push. Bonus: it collapsed small enough to fit into a gate-check bag designed for a large stroller, so once the oversized item was checked, we just wheeled the wagon to the gate and gate-checked it for free. Bonus: a large dog, placed in a wagon, does not get rammed into by oblivious people and their luggage or have his paws run over by luggage wheels. (But he doesn’t enjoy it much). The wagon itself is our “cargo carry” now that we don’t have a car, capable of toting over 300 pounds/150 kilos – we carried our balcony chairs home from the furniture store in it.
We had 6 suitcases, one oversized bicycle case, and a dog, and were able to easily manage all of this through three airports and two hotels with two people.
Getting across the country
Because we were travelling with a dog, we found it best to enter the EU directly at Lisbon rather than flying via London. This meant flying first to the east coast, and then taking off from one of the airports there that has direct service. It also meant heavily researching flight times, departure and arrival weather, and aircraft seat configurations to understand how to make the trip tolerable for our dog. Angel is a service dog, and travels in the cabin with me, which means foot space is a consideration, too.
My dog provides mobility support – which means he’s big. Considering the size of my shepherd and the length of the flight, we decided it was worth the investment to travel first class. Two bulkhead seats = one entire side of the aisle, and just enough foot space for all three of us. It also made the cost of tickets significantly higher.
We could have continued on to Lisbon that night but that would have meant that one flight delay could mess up the rest of the trip so we opted to stay overnight. We travelled early in the day so we’d have lots of time to check in to our hotel, take Angel for a walk, and try to settle in to some familiar routines to minimize the stress on him. A full day in a hotel is boring and stressful too, though, so we connected with a friend and went out to lunch the next day. If our party had been just humans, we might have either flown via London and stayed a few days or taken a train cross country. But time and travel considerations for Angel meant that a quick trip directly to Lisbon was best.
“How do I get my dog classified as a service dog so he can go in the cabin?”
Start by acquiring a life-changing, medically diagnosed disability that makes it harder for you to get around in the world, requiring additional assistance just to navigate things that other people do without thinking.
A service dog is medical equipment, not a fashion accessory. Lying about your pet so that you don’t need to deal with the inconvenience of pet travel makes it harder for those of us who need this support so much that we spend years training ourselves and our dogs.
It’s also a federal crime.
Consider your timelines and restrictions – a leisurely trip or a mini-vacation en route can really reduce the stress level.
Getting to Lisbon
We chose a late-evening departure, specifically to facilitate the time zone change. Waking up too-early and getting on an early-morning flight from Seattle had helped to make the three-hour adjustment to the east coast easier. We were tired when we arrived mid-afternoon, so even though it was early afternoon in Seattle, it felt later and we were able to sleep more or less normally, though we woke up tired and a little off. But it was a further five hour difference to Lisbon. While it takes most bodies a week to ten days to truly adjust the time zones, getting on a legit sleeping schedule early is a huge help.
With that in mind, we put our slightly-tired-and-out-of-sorts selves on a plane in the mid-evening, had a meal, and went to sleep.
Here again, the extra cost of first class was worth it. From the special lounge at the airport with its “quiet rooms” to escape the bustle, to the lie-flat seats that allowed us to rest comfortably, there was a huge impact to stress and sleep that was worth the cost. The plane landed at 8:30 in the morning and we woke up feeling like it was morning. While we would feel the general fatigue of adjustment for a few days, we were immediately on a reasonably-aligned day-night schedule for sleep, which mitigated the fatigue, made the adjustment period shorter, and made it easier to get stuff done. There’s a lot of business to be done once your feet hit the ground, so being rested and alert is essential.
Getting to our new home
The last stage of our journey was to get from the airport to our new home. This isn’t a hard trip: there’s a train station close by the airport, and a train that goes direct to the local station 1 km from our apartment. But…stepping out of the airport with our suitcases, wagon, and dog really wasn’t the moment we wanted to figure out the train, or try to find our way along the city streets to our apartment. Timing mattered, as well, since we’d need to meet our landlord to pick up keys. We hired a ground transport instead. You can reserve a ground transport on the airport’s web site, but… We opted for a small business repeatedly recommended in one of our expat groups.
This meant adding WhatsApp to our resources (while not as common in the USA, it’s a major communication line in other places), communicating exactly what needed to be transported – humans, dogs, suitcases, size of the oversized bag – and where it was going. It also provided the opportunity to understand requirements, and arrive with the right things in hand – in our case, a seat belt adapter that would allow us to secure Angel would be legally required. We ordered one on Amazon – but would have been “stuck” to discover this at the airport when a web-reserved ground transport arrived. WhatsApp was also our connection to meet up with our driver, and to let our landlord know when we left the airport so he could meet us rather than waiting all morning at the apartment for us to turn up. After all, we weren’t the only people impacted, right?
