0565 Anacortes - packing and cleaning

15^th – 21^st July 2016

Just when you think you have reached the end………

I had a week in Anacortes before heading to Houston, and my primary jobs were to clean and pack the car ready for shipment back to Australia, and to finalise the shipping.  No big deal……..right ?

Wrong !   

But if you have to wait around anywhere, my sister's house in Anacortes in not a bad choice. There is Washington Park just a 5 minute walk down the road, with views out over the San Juan Islands as you walk around a beautiful forrested two mile circuit.  Or you can cycle round it if you have enough energy and leg power to get up the hills !  In addition there is so much wildlife around here you feel as though you are truly out in the wilds.  A beautiful spot on this earth.  

Most people think that cleaning a car is a 1-2 hour job.  Unfortunately for Australia this is not true – In fact I have met many European Overlanders during my trip who have actually chosen NOT to ship their vehicle to Australia because the cleaning and preparation can be such a hassle.  One has to get every bug out of the radiator, every squashed bug off the body work, dust and dirt out of everywhere, and even the inside of the wheels cleaned. And with the motorhome one has to remove all food and traces of food that might have fallen down cracks, and every blade of grass or seed that somehow has got into cupboards, behind shelves, or down beside the seats.  One miserable bug found by customs in Australia will require a total reclean.

So basically for 4 days I cleaned and washed, paying particular attention to the front of the car and engine bay, and the underneath of the car.  Meanwhile, I was also emptying out every cupboard, cleaning inside the cupboards (I think there was still some Australian red dust in there as well Arctic and Patagonian dirt road dust, plus a bit of the Sahara and more recently some Labrador dirt just to even it all up !)  By the end of the 3^rd day (and I am talking about solid 8 hour days here !) I was getting very tired, and quite stiff from crawling in and out of the car as well as rolling around underneath it.

Then, just when I thought I was just about finished, I saw a hole in one of the chassis rails and stuck my finger in there – And found solid mud !  So I then had to spend the next couple of hours sticking the water hose into every hole in every chassis rail until the water flowed out clear rather then reddy-brown, and a finger stuck in any hole came out clean – Just in case some customs guy sticks his finger in there !  I don’t think the underneath (or inside of the chassis rails) have even been as clean since they left the factory !

At last it was virtually all done, and most stuff was packed back inside for the shipment, and a full inventory taken for Customs purposes.   Then the shipper called me ……….

Basically, I have been quoted as high as US $4200  for the freight back to Australia (just the freight and export costs – not Brisbane port and paperwork fees), down to as low as US$1800 for a shared 40 ft container out of Los Angeles. So I had chased up this $1800 quote to make sure I wasn’t missing something in the small print – and once that was determined, and I had provided all sorts of details of paperwork, I was told I just needed one last form to show the car had officially been “imported” into the United States.

Well, on this trip I had actually imported the car into Canada from Europe, and when you cross a road border between Canada and the USA , they don’t provide any car paperwork – they just check your passport.  With a foreign passport and foreign (and current) registration on the car, I am not actually “importing” the car,  but am just a tourist crossing a border temporarily – Just like an American driving his US registered car into Canada for a vacation, or an Englishman driving to France.  So despite having crossed the borders between Canada and the USA some 4 or 5 times, the only car paperwork I have are the papers from  when it arrived in Nova Scotia from Europe.  Now I am told that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in Los Angeles require me to go back to a border, re-enter the USA and get a form 7501 signed before they will allow the car to be “exported” through Long Beach and out of the USA.

So early on Monday morning (18^th July) I set off north again towards the nearest Canadian Border, at Blaine, just south of Vancouver, about 80 miles away.  My sister Janet came with me for the ride.  When we get to the border it was about 30 minutes of queuing before we got to the Canadian Customs kiosk, and when we told the man we actually just wanted to do a U Turn so we could go back into the US in order to get a form signed, he said “Oh, you didn’t need to come across the border – You could have just parked and walked across to the US offices” !!     So now we were faced with an even longer queue to get back into the US !!  Grrrr !

But then he kindly pulled a temporary barrier out of the way and let us get into the US queue almost at the front – How nice was that ? !  So 15 minutes later we were at the US Customs kiosk, and the poor guy didn’t know what we were talking about, so he gave us a piece of paper with question marks all over it, told us to park and take it into the office to see the CBP people inside.

So in we go, explain it all again, and are basically told by them that this form 7501 is for use only by US citizens and businesses when importing goods, and anyway I am not “importing” my car, so there is no way they can sign that form, or any other form, because no paperwork is required !  A quick phone call to my shipping people in LA, but they are adamant the CBP LA require this paperwork, so with no other ideas forthcoming, I leave the border.  It is very frustrating because as everyone knows, when dealing with border security personnel in any country nowadays, it is not a good idea to start querying them, or getting frustrated with them !!

So I leave the border and head 80 miles back to Anacortes, somewhat frustrated !  I toss around a few other ideas with the shipping people, and the next morning I call the LA / Long Beach CBP office and am told in no uncertain terms that I must get a form 7501 signed.  I told them that the CBP personnel in both Seattle and Blaine border post assure me that this form is not required, but LA say that without it they will not let my car be exported.  Eventually they agree that just a letter with certain details in it (ie the details off the 7501 form !), certifying that my car has actually crossed into the USA, will suffice, as long as it is signed by a CBP officer.

So back to Seattle and Blaine CBP, who basically tell me they refuse to sign anything like that, and Blaine actually end up telling me not to disturb them any more, and if I want to take it any further I should read the US Freedom of Information act and proceed according to that.   If you google the FoI Act you will see that it is hard to understand (especially for a poor lay man like myself), but basically I take it that I need to get a lawyer who will then be able to force the CBP to give me the information I require !   As if I am about to do that !!

So here we have what I understand to be a Federal department in which each independent State or Regional office has totally different ideas on which particular paperwork is required for a particular action – In this case one department is telling me to fill out a certain form, but every other department is telling me they won’t do it because that form is not required by me as a tourist. 

Ho Hum.   So be it.   After feeling totally frustrated, and unable to do anything about it, I am now proceeding with shipping out of Seattle, but I can no longer use a 40 ft shared container, or get the “good price” out of LA, so it is going to cost me an additional US$1400 !!   Unbelievable.

But then it all got even more ridiculous…………..

Photos are here :-  No they are not.  It seems that in the last few days Picasa Photos has shut down, and I now have to use Google photos.  So I now have to try to work out a way to get my photos out of Picasa and put them in Google and then how to download them and link them into here !  I don't like the thought that Cloud programmes like these can just shut down !!! 

Here now !!   https://goo.gl/photos/VxBWeExVcUub5xT99