We Made It With the Wonder Doodle!

[Nickleback99]

Well, We FINALLY made it back to the Philippines on our Covid delayed move and hopefully are here to stay, although kept our house in WA state just in case.  Intent though is to stay since most of our family is Here and we need to save real $ for our son later in case he has problems as adult with some level of ASD.   And as the title relates, we made it here with our 55 lbs Goldendoodle (son's dog, although seems to be "mine" for now responsibility wise.)   That was quite the drill Before departing, yet quite simple upon arrival since had my ducks in a row for the pooch documents.  Note you gotta work through both US (or home country) and Philippine governments to get both the Export permit and the more  obvious RP Import permit.  Ironically, the level of customer service and help I got from RP's BAI was Much better than what I got from my own govt and USDA, and BAI responded to emails and expedited my request for permit application processing when got to crunch time.   All in all was a bit stressful since the windows working within on US side are slim (10 days ain't much when ya got a whole lot to get done and multiple Vet visits and numerous online applications.)  I was surprised how hard it was to find a Vet doing the animal wellness certifications program for overseas moves, as None of the vets in our decent sized home city of Bellingham on the Canada border, including our vet in next county over, do them anymore and had to travel about 40 mi each way, multiple times, to different town with lots of military and international travelers to get a needed Vet.  Then there was the dealings with PAL since we chose the only airline flying direct to lessen dog stress on her first ever flight....gotta request on line for pet to travel and within certain time limit....Ironically, it was not until the 4th time talking to them that Anyone there said I had to do this special email request to their unusual email address for that purpose.  All the others before said essentially, "It's fine sir. Just show up at the airport with required paperwork."....Nope!   All in all, total cost to us was probably $1500 for vet, new vaccines/boosters and flying oversized cargo costs, but using as pet relocation service door to door would've been $5,000!   Again, Nope!   Anyway, if anyone has any questions on the process for pet transport, just message me and be glad to help best I can.  

 We are now working on locking down a permanent location for after the Holidays with family here in Caloocan City, with eyes on Dumaguete since Silliman K-12 has program we need for kiddo and lots of expats for me to talk to, and also on Antipolo and Santa Rosa, Laguna areas here on Luzon, which have schools we need as well.  Will be checking the later two while here before heading to Duma to compare.  Anyway, Look forward to meeting some folks in Duma in January.  Cheers and Merry Christmas!

[stevewool]

Good luck in settling in the Philippines 

[Old55]

Good for you leaving The Socialist Peoples Republic of Washington State.

Keep us posted on all your new adventures in Philippines. 

[Nickleback99]

6 hours ago, Old55 said:

Good for you leaving The Socialist Peoples Republic of Washington State.

Keep us posted on all your new adventures in Philippines. 

Thanks and hope to see you over here!  Sorry we didn't get down south to meet as hoped back there; the last 6 months were a Tazmanian Devil whirlwind trying to get ready with the house, etc.   I Will miss the natural beauty everywhere one turns in Pac NW, but lots to see and appreciate here.  The pic of kid and pooch was the 10 mile lake we lived on mountain overlooking.    And it is a small world...."Met" my first expat t(from Colorado) this morning since arrival and chatted a bit with our dogs in tow...turned out his best friend moved to/lives in Bellingham now.

Edited December 22, 2022 by Nickleback99

[Mike J]

Good to see your dog arrived safely.  Keep an eye out for cane toads.  Their skin contains a neurotoxin that can be fatal to dogs.  That is how we lost our beloved westie.

Here is info on cane toad poisoning in dogs and what to do if it happens.

https://www.greencrossvets.com.au/pet-library/articles-of-interest/cane-toad-poisoning/

 

 

 

[JJReyes]

My daughter-in-law, at one point of her career, was a US Army Vet.  Her duty base was Washington state assigned to a naval station (the army supplies all the vets to different branches).  Under her command was one person preparing shots and paperwork for pets of service personnel being assigned overseas.  She also went overseas, including the Philippines, when they were transporting multiple sentry dogs.  

[Tommy T.]

Our Mutt will certainly be pleased to entertain yours!

[Nickleback99]

On 12/21/2022 at 5:47 PM, Tommy T. said:

Our Mutt will certainly be pleased to entertain yours!

That'll work!    But, for some reason, can't open the photo my end.

[Nickleback99]

On 12/21/2022 at 5:03 PM, Mike J said:

Good to see your dog arrived safely.  Keep an eye out for cane toads.  Their skin contains a neurotoxin that can be fatal to dogs.  That is how we lost our beloved westie.

Here is info on cane toad poisoning in dogs and what to do if it happens.

https://www.greencrossvets.com.au/pet-library/articles-of-interest/cane-toad-poisoning/

 

 

 

I'm really sorry to hear that Mike and sorry for your loss.  Can't imagine!   Thanks for the info as I'd never heard of that until now.  Familiar with the one tree frog of some kind with similar characteristics and I guess fatal to humans as well via skin toxin.  I'll have to do some research as I imagine our place in Valencia in April has variouis frogs in area.  Saw what I thought was a bull frog looking toad in a puddle in garage when we were in Caloocan in Dec, but maybe it was something else.

[Jollygoodfellow]

40 minutes ago, Nickleback99 said:

That'll work!    But, for some reason, can't open the photo my end.

Theres been some sort of a glitch that has stuffed up some images so they don't show.