June 19 Th
Finally on the road !
The LandCruiser has finally touched the Canadian soil !.
You will hear a LOT more about soil in this story.
On Monday the 17th, we contacted the shipping company for news
about our cargo and they could confirm that the container had arrived in
Halifax.
The question from the shipping agent was:
Is the car clean ?
No, we answered !
Then hell will break loose, he answered.
The guys from department of agriculture has decided to inspect
all incoming containers for soil and meat.
Shit, we should have cleaned the car with the high preassure cleaner
before shipping.
We then went to the custom's office to get our "cargo" cleared.
The lady at the office was very friendly and helpfull and asked
for the relevant paper.
Then she handed us a form to be filled out with all the items in
the car !.
All items , we asked ??.
Yes, all items that you are bringing into Canada, and their value
!!.
We completed the list from our best memory.
You have to remember that we shipped the car almost 3 weeks ago.
Back at the counter we returned the " less than complete list".
Then we handed the friendly lady our "Carnet du Passage" on the
car.
Ahh, that changes everything she replyed.
Now the list of mobile phones, computers, Inmarsat terminals, camping
gear and accessories was obsolete.
We don't fully understand why, but she imideatly stamped our custom's
papers and we were cleared.
We then went to department of agriculture to get the car cleared
from their side.
The friendly guy there told us that if there were any traces of
soil on the vehicle the we would have to go trough a full cleaning procedure
!.
While being at the office, the inspector arrived with samples of
the good Danish soil in a small container !.
Hell was loose !!.
Now the had to clean our car in a secured area, unfortunatly in
a different container terminal that the container had arrived, at our cost
,of course.
This would happen on Tuesday 18 Th.
We got up early in the morning to make sure that thing would go
ok.
W would under no circumstances allow other people to drive the
LandCruiser out of the container and we made that clear to our shipping
agent.
We arrived at the container terminal shortly before 10 in the morning
and found our container placed at the entrance.
What a relief to see it again.
After 1 hour of waiting, again, the container arrived at the designated
area where the cleaning would take place.
Opening the container was one of the highlights of the day.
The LandCruiser was unharmed :-))).
At the harbour area all people are in a union, protecting their
interests and hence 6-7 guys were involved in the unloading of the container.
Jens was fortunatly allowed to assist them and drive the Ctuiser
out of the container.
The LandCruiser at the designated cleaning area.
The actual cleaning with a high preassure cleaner took 1 hour !.
After the cleaning was complete, the inspectors from department
of agriculture showed up and did their inspection.
Approved !
Now we just needed to get the Cruiser cleared for leaving the harbour
area, which took somthing like 2 hours, imvolving additional paperwork
and stamping.
We was expecting to get a bill from the inspection and cleaning
in the order of 1000 Canadian $.
We were both happily surprised when we got the bill.
68 Canadian $ for the 2 inspections and 60 Canadian $ for the cleaning
of the Cruiser. :-))))))
After we loaded all our luggage into the Cruiser the result was
like this !!!.
Remeber the nice and organized picture from the shipping ?.
We imidiatly left Nova Scotia with the ferry to New Brunswick and
found a suitable campsite.
