Posting a tent to New Zealand

DeniG2

Hi,

We're travelling to New Zealand in September and plan to do split our accommodation between hotels, motels, B&Bs and camping. We already own a very good tent and want to bring it with us but when we enquired with our airline we found out that it's €60 per extra KG (which would mean €600 to bring our tent!!)

So now we're thinking about posting the tent over to NZ ahead of our trip. Has anybody done this before? An Post will deliver it for €80 but there is also the possibility of Import Tax over there (has anyone had this problem?).

Also the fact that it's a used tent, is there a possibility of the tent being quarantined if there is soil/bugs on the tent?

Thanks in advance for any help/suggestions

Denis

Mellor

It could be quarantined, if it was it would probably be destroyed.
you could prob pay to have it treated with radiation. Small fee I think.

TBH, it's prob easier to just buy one here.

greenline

I took a tent with me to NZ and Quarantine were all over it like a rash. They did let it in (because I had cleaned it very carefully -as in put it up in teh living room and hoovered it- I am not making this up). It is really really important that there is no soil on it, so we washed the bottom of the ground sheet with sponges of soapy water and of course the pegs, plus we checked the poles as some of them get bits of soil in there.

Afterwards we said: never a-bleedin-gain. Too much hassle- I'd go and buy one second hand if I had my time over.

To answer your question- there is more than a "possiblity" of it being quarantined. If there are soils/bugs on it, they would probably just burn it.

DeniG2

Thanks Mellor & greenline,

You've confirmed my suspicions, and it's not worth the hassle. The reason we were going to post the tent was in case the choices of tents was poor when we get there (demand for tents will probably be high because of the Rugby World Cup). We're now thinking about buying a tent online from a New Zealand website and have it delivered internally to one of our B&Bs in New Zealand.

Again, thanks for your help, you might have saved me from a whole world of pain

Denis

kiwipower

NZ is one of the natural homes of camping so I wouldnt be to worried about not being able to get a tent over there!

I have brought one over before, yes I had to wait in customs in Auckland Airport while it was cleaned and checked. (We had used it once before heading away.) I had hovered it and cleaned the pegs and ground sheet not to much of a biggy though.

JUST REMEMBER TO ALWAYS DECLARE IF YOU ARE BRINGING ANYTHING IN TO NZ EVEN IF YOUR NOT SURE IF IT NEEDS DECLARING!

I even declare the homemade christmas pudding I bring my Dad! The only trouble I had was the lovely Maori Gentleman working in Customs wanted it for his own Christmas dinner! Next time I will bring two and trade a christmas pudding for Kai Moana (Sea food) or Hungi (like a roast cooked in a dirt underground oven!)

I am desperatly craving Hungi at the moment! Considering starting a Hungi appreciation thread on boards! Need to find a gang in Ireland who cook Hungi! MMmmmmmmmmm! :P

EDIT ADD IN: One thing I think people need to be more aware of if they are planning on staying in tents in NZ during the RWC:

It is WINTER in NZ. Winter in NZ even by (normal) Irish terms canbe WET, WINDY and COLD! Dont forget you will be in NZ during the SKI season. The wind chill factor can bring outdoor temps down to the equivalent of 0degrees. By Windy I mean you can have 100km hour wind gusts coming straight of the Antartic Ice Caps up the country stopping to shill down more over the South Islands Alps. While we only have snow at altitude it does get cold at sea level and you are very exposed to these weather conditions if you are relying on a tent for shelter.