Scherer Family ~ European RV Tour: Step 1: Ship RV

16.July we had a hard deadline - the RV had to be at the dock in Baltimore, MD and as we found out the morning of the 16th, cleared by customs. Dan spent 4 days driving to Baltimore, basically stopping long enough to sleep and eat.

Jump to Sunday, midnight EST - I'm on the phone with a dejected Dan, who was turned away from a campground because it's too late. Thanks to an internet connection, MapPoint, and Dan reading street signs to me, I was able to find and direct him to a WalMart in Ellicott (just outside of Baltimore).

On a gut feeling, I called Dan first thing Monday morning (7:30 am PST, 10:30 am EST). "Sherry's Superpages" came in handy again, providing directions to Patapsco Valley State Park which was about 4 miles away from the WalMart. I had called in advance to be sure he could dump the tanks there and to Dan's surprise, they were expecting him when he pulled up. This would be the foreshadowing for the day.

I spent the next 2 hours making other various phone calls, mainly attempting to see if I could help Dan clear customs in a timely manner. We needed to take our original title with us (normal process is the shipper keeps it, after the vessel sails, they mail it to the shipping agent who sends it back to the owner. With a phone call to our shipping agent, we found out there was no way this would happen prior to our departure of 5.Aug.)

During these phone calls, I learned the shipping company had already extended their deadline for our RV and Monday was the LAST day they would accept it. I was duly warned that if customs decided to inspect a vehicle and it could be delayed about 3-days for inspection, followed by about 3-days to release, meaning we would miss the 21.July sailing.

I spent the next hour or so trying to reach the customs export office and was finally successful after calling the import line and explaining that exports was not answering their phone. I explained the scenario ("I'm in Seattle, my husband's on his way ... if we don't clear customs today and get the RV to the shipper, we miss our sailing... and our agent didn't disclose all this.... how can I help with the process?") - to which the gentleman on the phone responded, "assuming the paperwork is in order, I stamp it and he's done; takes about 30-seconds."

The time spent on the phone was beneficial - we had more knowledge about what to do than we had prior and Dan was expected at his various stops at the dock. 1) Go to security at the docks; 2) get directions to the customs office; 3) provide customs with the documentation (original title + 4 copies, 4 copies of the dock receipt); 4) they stamp all copies; 5) get in line at "lane 2." Oh, and do it all by 3:30 pm.

That done, I took off to work to start training my replacement. It was impossible - my mind was in Baltimore and every 30-45 minutes, I'd get a truncated call from Dan that went something like this: "I'm at the dock - oops, gotta go. Will call you later." or "Get me a taxi. I'm on Child's Street." Punted the training session to Tuesday, which was fine (it's on my paid vacation time anyway) and after finding a taxi that could pick up quickly at the docks and accepted credit cards, got the call back that a port security employee offered to take Dan to the airport.

Insert huge sigh of relief - RV is where it needed to be today; deadline met. I get the next call, "are you picking me up from the airport tonight?" ... here we go again.

Only bummer of the whole thing really is that we adhered to the "no personal goods" rule - shipping an empty unit with only the linens on the beds, a basic toolkit, a first aid kit and a broom. No one cared. No one inspected the unit or the storage compartments. Sure would have been nice to have a few other essentials (think dishes, hiking gear, school books) on board to save us the hassle of shipping or buying new in Europe.

It's good to be able to partner and offer support along the way. Key lessons: