So I cant believe we actually made it. We all arrived in one piece no major damage, all bags with everything still in them and the dogs and cat physically well but I dont know about emotionally yet.

We left St Petersburg, Florida, mini van packed to the gunnels 6am Sunday morning to try and get to Miami airport by 11am. We had our only upset of the whole trip before we left, Chris took one of the dog water containers out of the freezer and it fell on the counter and shattered, as this was something we had to have we needed to stop in Miami at Petsmart to pick up a new one before we got to the airport, luckily they had them in stock and we got to the airport right on 11.

When we arrived at MIA we of course needed the help of a porter with the animals and four very large heavy suitcases, he helped us put together Pumpkin’s crate and deposited me at the front of the line waiting for check in to open. While waiting for Chris to come back from dropping off the hire car the dogs were surprisingly good, I thought Pump would go nuts with so many people and noises, but both her and Moe just laid down and waited for Chris to get back, not knowing what lay ahead.

Luftansa were amazing. The people at the desk were great. They checked us all in, and didnt charge us any excess baggage even though all the bags were a bit heavy. They gave us a map to a dog park at the airport so they could do their business before being put in their crates. We also didnt want to check them in too early as it was bloody hot and we didnt want them sitting on the tarmac for too long. Something that did surprise us was the airline didnt ask to see any of the paper work for the animals, and we had a lot of it.

The flight from Miami to Frankfurt was pretty much full, but they had given us seats with the middle one spare so George and us would be comfortable.

I was very concerned how George would react to traveling with us as a passenger, in all our other moves he had gone with the dogs as freight, so this was a new experience. Our Vet had given us something to take the edge off him, but you have to be really careful as this stuff can kill them if given too much. The counter staff at Lufthansa said that the week before a lady had killed both of her cats by giving them an overdose of this stuff, apparently the cats had stopped breathing during the flight, poor things. Anyway, George only got a quarter of a pill early in the morning and then I gave him another quarter just before we left. So when we boarded he was chill and hardly complained at all. They only time on the nine hour flight he kicked up a fuss was when we both left the sets at the same time, it was only then people realised we had a cat with us but he settled down as soon as we got back to the seats.

It was a pretty uneventful flight, really old 747, no leg room, old monitors on the roof for movies which had very interesting colours on the screen, Winnie the Poo was blue. The seats where very uncomfortable so neither of us slept very much, and there was also no personal air vents so you could not control your air flow, which was awful.

We had a four hour lay over in Frankfurt. We found a McDonalds and had some breakfast, then went through two security check points and waited to board again. We again asked for three seats with a middle spare so we would have room for George and they where very helpful again, the flight was pretty empty. Our greatest concern was that the dogs wouldn’t get on the flight, the document that we had paid $US800 for, was date specific for the animals entry into India so we all needed to get there that night.

So this time we had an eight and a half hour flight on a newish Airbus A340, personal inflight entertainment and very nice crew. I had given George another quarter of a pill so he was very chill and there was more room on the floor this time so he just sat in between us on the floor. We both constantly checked him to make sure he was breathing as I was worried I would OD him.

I, as usual, had worked myself up worrying about anything and everything so I didnt feel particularly good, so let me tell you when they started heating up the food for lunch and the smell of curry permeated the cabin I wasn’t in a good place. Anyway, there was a very nice flight attendant who was a bit worried about me, I think I may have been a bit pale, and made me realise my problem was I hadn’t eaten much in the last two days so when I had some bread and juice all was right again. So again, an uneventful flight, some sleep but definitely not enough, and another time zone change.

When we were coming into land in Kolkata we looked at each and the nerves were in evidence, we were embarking on a new (another) adventure and if we were going to have any problems it would be now, going through customs with all our animals and bags.

So the first thing we do is stand at a desk and get asked if we have or have had any contact with people with swine flu, like you are going to say yes. We went straight through immigration no questions asked. Then had to wait for bags and dogs. The airport Veterinarian was waiting for us with our original NOC documents, the one we paid 800 bucks for, and asked us for the originals of the animals documentation so he could go and talk to Customs. We were very popular, we had lots of people wanting to help us with our bags, so the Vet was very helpful and organised two men for us and they got all our bags and then two other gentlemen came out with the dogs, there was a lot of stuff. Remember we are coming here for a year, we needed more than a backpack. We headed over to customs and the Vet told us to go through the green line, which was odd to us as we had some stuff that definitely should have gone through the red line, I don’t know who the Vet talked to but we just walked straight out, nobody looked at anything. Our ride to the guest house was waiting and so were the people who were taking the animals for us as they couldnt stay with us at the guest house. We were very surprised that it had gone as smoothly as it did, but Chris had done a pretty awesome job of organising everything.

The people from the Animal Welfare place insisted that we come and see where the dogs would be staying, so at 12.30am our driver followed this dodgy old van, with Pump’s crate hanging out the door, I wish I’d had my camera, to where they were staying. Chris met everyone then walked the dogs and handed them over. They were staying in the apartment of the guy who lives upstairs fo the Animal Welfare place, The dogs made themselves comfortable on his bed and then we headed on to the guest house. It was about 1.15am by the time we got here and man were we tired. The guest house is basically a 3 bedroom apartment owned by the company Chris is working for, and we will be staying here until our permanent accommodation is organised, hopefully sooner rather than later.