Yea, I know it's been a long time since any new blog posts - lots of family stuff going on, not much sailing stuff. We’re getting ready to get back down to Australia and get Georgia back in the water. She's been sitting in the Bundaberg, Australia sun being carefully watched by kangaroos for too long. We’ve had a great time being exceptional grandparents to our above average granddaughter. We can both speak toddler like a charm, are very experienced with some great kids shows, Curious George being my clear favorite.
Australia is really anal about requiring visas for travel. They have a number of tourist visas, each one with increasing stay times and increasing hoops to jump through. The first issue we ran into was when I realized I only had 6 months left on my US passport, not enough to apply for a one year visa. Because I lost my passport ID card a few years ago when my wallet went overboard in New Zealand I could not apply online. I made an appointment at the Bellingham post office and got some great service.
After a couple of weeks I had my new passport in hand. Now to start the online forms for an Aussie visa. A 30 day visa is a couple of forms to fill out and free. A multiple entry visa good for 12 months with a maximum stay of 90-days at a time requires a few more forms and about $25. Having to leave the country every 90-days to re-up the visa was not going to work for us. That brings us to the 12 month, multiple entry up to 12 months at a time stay visa. This visa requires a bunch more forms, including listing every country you’ve been in for the last 5 years with dates. A not short list for Chris and I.
After filing for this visa online we fairly quickly got a response that we are required to have an Aussie approved medical, including chest xray and UAs (urinary analysis). There are a limited number of approved sites in the US you can use for a medical. There’s one in Seattle, but that's a long drive for us. We decided to make an appointment with a clinic in Vancouver, BC. I expected this to be a quick pay your bill and the doc would make sure you can still fog a mirror held under your nose type exam. Wrong. They take this stuff seriously. You have to explain all meds you are using. Get poked and prodded. Chest x ray, UA and plus a blood donation for me.
The purpose of the chest x-ray is to protect the delicate Australians from tuberculosis. Certainly a noble cause, but just doesn’t seem very practical since we have already spent 3 months in the country. After about 3 or 4 days we were both told we had to get another UA. Apparently the quality of our piss has been compromised by drinking too many bottles of Black Butte Porter. So we set up with a lab in Bellingham to collect our piss and look closely into it so we could send the results to the Vancouver clinic. About a week after the second UA Chris got her visa. My med results were referred to something called Buppa, the medical review company the Aussies use to check the hardcore cases. After another week of being Buppa’d I received my visa.
Around $750 and 3 weeks latter we had electronic visas in-hand. Now was time to figure out flights back to Australia. Chris has to do a few weeks work in Kathmandu before heading back. I was gonna head back to Bundy the first week of Nov but there is a too large sailbaot cruiser rally from New Caledonia heading to the marina and they don’t have any slip space for me to put the boat while I get her back together for cruising. So I’ll head out of here Nov 11 and we can launch Georgia Nov 15. At least that todays plans.
Paul
Happy and above average grandkid with just as happy granparental units
Australia is really anal about requiring visas for travel. They have a number of tourist visas, each one with increasing stay times and increasing hoops to jump through. The first issue we ran into was when I realized I only had 6 months left on my US passport, not enough to apply for a one year visa. Because I lost my passport ID card a few years ago when my wallet went overboard in New Zealand I could not apply online. I made an appointment at the Bellingham post office and got some great service.
After a couple of weeks I had my new passport in hand. Now to start the online forms for an Aussie visa. A 30 day visa is a couple of forms to fill out and free. A multiple entry visa good for 12 months with a maximum stay of 90-days at a time requires a few more forms and about $25. Having to leave the country every 90-days to re-up the visa was not going to work for us. That brings us to the 12 month, multiple entry up to 12 months at a time stay visa. This visa requires a bunch more forms, including listing every country you’ve been in for the last 5 years with dates. A not short list for Chris and I.
After filing for this visa online we fairly quickly got a response that we are required to have an Aussie approved medical, including chest xray and UAs (urinary analysis). There are a limited number of approved sites in the US you can use for a medical. There’s one in Seattle, but that's a long drive for us. We decided to make an appointment with a clinic in Vancouver, BC. I expected this to be a quick pay your bill and the doc would make sure you can still fog a mirror held under your nose type exam. Wrong. They take this stuff seriously. You have to explain all meds you are using. Get poked and prodded. Chest x ray, UA and plus a blood donation for me.
The purpose of the chest x-ray is to protect the delicate Australians from tuberculosis. Certainly a noble cause, but just doesn’t seem very practical since we have already spent 3 months in the country. After about 3 or 4 days we were both told we had to get another UA. Apparently the quality of our piss has been compromised by drinking too many bottles of Black Butte Porter. So we set up with a lab in Bellingham to collect our piss and look closely into it so we could send the results to the Vancouver clinic. About a week after the second UA Chris got her visa. My med results were referred to something called Buppa, the medical review company the Aussies use to check the hardcore cases. After another week of being Buppa’d I received my visa.
Around $750 and 3 weeks latter we had electronic visas in-hand. Now was time to figure out flights back to Australia. Chris has to do a few weeks work in Kathmandu before heading back. I was gonna head back to Bundy the first week of Nov but there is a too large sailbaot cruiser rally from New Caledonia heading to the marina and they don’t have any slip space for me to put the boat while I get her back together for cruising. So I’ll head out of here Nov 11 and we can launch Georgia Nov 15. At least that todays plans.
Paul
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