Miami Arrival

Thursday, 10 July 2008

On Thursday, I finally received the CITES documents I was waiting for. When I looked at them, I realized I had to schedule an appointment with an inspector at the port of departure... then they would put their stamp on it. (Otherwise they weren't really valid.) When I called their office in Miami I discovered they close at 4:00 pm Fridays, and they have no one available to do inspections on the weekends. Of course this complicates things because I'm supposed to bring the birds to Amerijet on Sunday evening for processing. The inspector also needs to stamp the "original" processing paperwork from Amerijet... a faxed copy won't do. So now I'm caught in a "catch 22"... I can't schedule the inspection until I have the processing papers from Amerijet, and I can't get them processed without the stamped CITES document! Every time I think I've reached the end of this trail, it seems another complication pops up!

Now, it's Thursday evening (around 6pm)... and I still haven't figured out what I'm doing with my Jeep. I'd been working on that problem during the day. My brother-in-law found out that Budget rental has cars available for one-way trips... from airport to airport. So we decided that was an option. I stopped at the auto auction where I was working part-time because someone suggested using a transporter to bring the Jeep back from Florida for selling it in PA. I got a price & phone number from a transporter there (which was about the same cost to rent a car from Harrisburg). Now I have 2 options! My sister offered to drive me (her car or my jeep) to Florida, where her husband could get a cheap one-way flight to meet her for the drive back on Tuesday. Now I have 3 options, but I still need to know how to handle the sale of the jeep. AND we decided to try to get to Florida before 4:00 pm on FRIDAY, so I would have time to see the inspector personally and carry the paperwork back & forth between them and Amerijet in Miami. Keep in mind... drive time from our location in PA to Miami: approx. 19 hours. (Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock!)

OK, I can leave the Jeep with our friends in PA. They know a dealer that could sell it for me. All I have to do is run over to see them (about a 5-min drive) to sign over the title & get it notarized. Oops... they're out of town at a car show! Finally got them to allow me to sign the title (without the notary's presence), as long as I leave them a photocopy of my driver's license. OK... I'm leaving the jeep with our friends, and they'll follow through with getting it sold in PA. I'll rent a car from Harrisburg Airport. I called Budget to make arrangements for that... BUT no cars available for one-way trip until Friday. Well, there's still the option of using the transporter from Florida, or we'll take my sister's car now. How soon can we be ready to leave? (Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock!)

OK, the jeep is staying in PA; we're taking my sister's Volvo for the trip. Quickly clean out the jeep & gather all my crap while I wait for her to arrive... I have a half hour once she leaves her home, but she has to pack first as well. Collect my stuff... collect the bird's stuff... no time to organize anything, just make sure I have it all. One last hug for the cat (he'll be fine here). Charlotte (my sister) arrived around 7:30. We loaded up everything, including the birds, said my final good-byes (cried a little), quick hugs and we were on our way by 7:50 pm for a long, boring, all-night drive to Miami on I-95.

Joey loves to ride in the car, so he entertained us with his whistling until it got dark. Since there was nothing interesting to look at along the way, we entertained ourselves by trying to trim minutes off our arrival time, which showed up on her GPS system as 1:39 pm! Charlotte figured out how to trim off 1 minute for every 12 miles... of course, that meant driving about 80 mph!) So she would be able to trim off about 15 minutes during her turn to drive, then I would have to pee and that usually put us back to where we started!

We arrived in Miami around 1:50 pm, but it was close to 2:30 till we figured out how to get into the Amerijet office... Miami temp today is in the high 90's. (I saw 101 at some point that afternoon!) They were extremely pleasant & helpful in getting the processing started early! They wrote up the order & I paid for their flight ($196). They gave the birds back to me so I could now run them over to the Fish & Wildlife inspector, with the paperwork. I'll bring them back here on Sunday evening. We loaded up in the car again, and with the help of her GPS, we went right to the Fish & Wildlife office which happened to be nearby. I called first & was told the inspector was at lunch for the next half hour, so we'll just go there & wait. (Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock!)

Their office was in a building which also housed a post office location. While we stood there waiting outside their door, someone came by & saw we had these birds with us. He told us that if we were waiting for the inspector, they moved to another building! So once again, we head to the car, plug in the new address & we're on our way... it's now about 3:30 pm (which should have given him time to get back from lunch)! (Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock!) We finally found him on the second floor at the new location. He was very pleasant as well. I had another declaration form to fill out. While I'm working on this, my cell phone rings... It's the Chief Veterinarian's office in Grenada, who's been trying to send me a faxed document but it wasn't going through. (Because my fax machine is IN THE CONTAINER, and my home phone number is disconnected!) I haven't had time to check in to a hotel, so I don't have a number to give her to resend it... It's now 3:46 pm. I ask if I can call her back when I get a fax number for her. She says, "Yes, but I need it by 4:00 pm." !!!!??\**!#@!!! OK... so the inspector returns from the back room and I asked him if he has a fax number that I could use to receive a document from Grenada. "No problem!" So while he's finishing up with my documents, inspecting the birds, etc. I'm calling her back with the number, telling her she needs to send it right away.

By the time the inspector makes copies and gives them all his final seal, he retrieved the fax for me & we were finally finished collecting all the necessary paperwork. It was now 4:00 pm. We now need to find a "pet-friendly" hotel. I'd heard that Days Inn allows pets, and there's one near the airport... so off we go! (We're both really losing "steam" by now due to the lack of sleep.)

I went inside at Days Inn to see if they had a room available... "Yes, they do!" When I asked if they allow pets, the clerk motioned me to the side door of his workspace. Then he stepped out to ask me (in a whisper) what size is my dog? I told him I had 2 parrots in a small dog crate that I'm planning to ship overseas. He told me he'd allow it (because they like pets!), but he'll put us in a room on the end... in case they're noisy. Then he said I should just cover them with a towel when housekeeping comes in to clean. (And there was no extra charge!)

We finally made it into a room at 5:00 pm. So here we are... holed up at Days Inn! We got into the air-conditioned room and cleaned off the "stink" (showered) before collapsing for the evening. We're not sure what we're going to do for the next few days, but at least we have a little "down time" to figure it out!