United States/Canada to Panama
Travelling with your dog – exploring mountain sides, walking deserted beaches and exploring cobblestone roads – it’s truly the dream isn’t it? For many of us our dogs are members of the family and leaving them at home during extended vacations is not ideal. Even more so now in the post-Covid, remote friendly world, many of us are relocating to new countries and new ways of living and we want to bring our dogs with us.
As I repeatedly stated in the article PLEASE do not get your travel instructions from websites – you will end up with incomplete, incorrect or stress inducing information that is not based on current requirements. This article is not meant to give you specific instructions but give you an idea of my experience and what you can do to make yours as pleasant as possible.
I am choosing to start this series with travel to Panama because out of all the countries I have travelled to within North America, Europe and the Americas, Panama was by FAR the most complicated, stressful and expensive. I actually even managed to minimize my costs substantially because of certain knowledge I had, and many people spend thousands of dollars on bringing one or two dogs with them, and this cost is just not necessary. Most of it ends up being paid as a result of fear around the process, lack of ability to communicate in Spanish, and people on the internet trying to scare people due to their own experiences or because they wish to make money off the fearful.
It is also worth mentioning that I didn’t fly to Panama from Canada or the United States, I flew from Mexico which added a layer of complexity because of Mexico’s shipping requirements of pets when flying to Central or South America (the rules are different for Canada and the U, but are similar to what my final solution ended up being).
In the past travelling with my dogs to various places in the world was fairly simple – a form was needed to be filled out by the Veterinarian confirming the health of the dogs and their shots being up to date, some sort of a stamp from a Government body was required to validate the Vet’s credibility (sometimes handled by the Vet, sometimes something I sought out), the flight was booked and listo – we’d be on our way!
It came as a huge shock then when beginning the process for Panama to find out what seemed like a million rules and requirements. The first thing that made their process more complicated was additional legal requirements – the Vet statement stamped by a Government body was not sufficient in this case. It also needed to be authenticated by the Panamanian embassy of the country I was currently located in. In my case that would have meant that I had to get the Vet certificate (within 8 days of the flight according to the Copa Airline requirements) stamped by the Government body, get it back and then immediately send it to Mexico City to the Panamanian Consulate to have it authenticated and returned.
On top of all of this, Mexico’s travel rules for dogs dictated that if an airline didn’t accept dogs as checked baggage they HAD to be flown through a separate cargo carrier. This means that the paperwork triples and that the dog is sent (potentially) on a different flight than you, to be picked up in the cargo area. The amount of complications and frustrations this created was immense – pages of paperwork, trying to coordinate flights, how to get the dogs to the airport if I had to leave before or after them. Then came the cherry on top – the cheapest quote I received from the cargo company was a $1000 for both dogs, and the average cost was $2000. $2000 USD for a 2.5 hour flight!!
Saying No Thank You to Silly Rules
I was looking at a $2500 USD bill for myself and my dogs to take a 2.5 hour flight on top of what seemed like a never ending circus of paperwork and regulations. I was super frustrated initially but was determined to find a way that made more sense. In my endless searching I came across a blog (thanks guys!) talking about taking their dogs to Costa Rica. An idea sprung to mind – what if the flight regulations to Costa Rica were more normal to what we had been used to previously?
Like a a person possessed I began to google and hallelujah! I found the answer to my solution! If you are travelling with your dog from United States/Canada to Panama please check out this post for the end of the story!