Fear of Flying
Our flight to France was at 6:55PM. Agnes picked us up at 3:30 and off we went. We had a lot of anxiety about this flight. We were moving to France so we had Jozi, our cat, and Kika, our dog with us. We went through an ordeal just to prepare for the trip. Pets had to be micro chipped, certificates of health gotten by USDA approved vets, vaccines updated, rabies, sleeping pills gotten, new cages for travel, etc etc etc. We had heard stories of conflicting requirements between Air France and French Customs. We wanted to believe we were prepared but were unsure.
We arrived at the airport in plenty of time. Sedatives given, to the pets I mean. We waited in a short line to check in. We went to the security check point and were through in less than 15 minutes. That’s the least painful arrival I have been to in years. I had emptied all our change in our house into my pocket since we were moving to France. We ate in the airport and our bill was $17.86 and Ihad exactly $12.86 in change so I just gave a 5 with it. Perfect, no more change jangling. Exact change.
We waited for the plane, boarded, had a slight delay on the tarmac, and then took off. The flight had very little turbulence so we had few worries about the pets who were in the hold, not with us but not with the baggage. It is a pressurized room. There were movies on demand on the flight, we both started to watch one, and then fell asleep. We slept nearly the whole way. About an hour before arrival we had one more paper for the pets to fill out, a French translation of the certificates of health. It was complicated and didn’t match the English forms exactly but we filled it out as completely as possible. After my VISA experience and stories from the vets were started to worry.
We got off the plane, went through customs, no questions asked, waited maybe 10 minutes to get our luggage, we asked where pets come out, walked over to wait, 2 minutes later the cages were put out of the room, we picked them up, no one asked to see our papers, no bags searched, no one asked for out pet tickets to verify they were in fact ours, went to the car rental counter, our reservation was found, we were given the keys to a car, and off we went. I don’t think we were in the airport more than 30 minutes. I have never been through an airport so quickly, even before 9/11. I am still astounded at how quickly, easily, and without problem our travel was.