Canadian flag on a backpack

Since most Kiwis are very polite by American standards (they don’t shoot at you when you wander onto their front lawn), conversation often starts by asking how long you’ll be in New Zealand and if you’re enjoying yourself. Soon though, everyone wants to know where you’ve come from. The  subject can be a difficult one to approach anywhere in the world, and Kiwis are notably careful when asking, which is where we’ve noticed an interesting trend: people usually go with “Canada” as their first guess. Of course, we take no offence, in fact given recent political history, it can be taken as more of a compliment. Stitching a maple leaf to your backpack is a time honored tradition for recent high school graduates heading to Europe for a summer, and many blue-staters have considered, if only for a moment, moving to the land of Gretzky. But since the US is around ten times more populous than Canada, it makes one wonder whether Canadians just get out more or if asking a Canadian if they’re from The States would ruffle a few goose feathers.
America is huge, and there are a wide range of accents to guess at. Wisconsinites don’t sound like southerners, or like people from Boston or any other notable American dialect, so maybe a string of Wisconsin dont’cha’knows sounds more Canadian than anything else. I suppose the American accent could have been permanently associated with George Bush’s nonsensical idioms and bumblings, which is probably more the influence of Jon Stewart than anything else. I guess it could be that Kiwis just assume you’re from Canada unless you’re looking for a gun show or a restaurant serving 64-ounce slabs of corn-fed beef for under $10.
I think our best theory so far is that New Zealanders, who are often mistaken for Australians, feel a sense of solidarity with Canadians who get confused for Americans.
Whatever the explanation, I’ll take it as a compliment. Besides, Wisconsin is closer to Toronto than Los Angeles, New York or Houston, so it’s a reasonable guess.

Thankfully, the internet can help you and Grandma chat anytime, even if she thinks that a Twitter is something to do with The Facebook or maybe The Google. A thoughtful grandkid can hook Grandma up so that she can call New Zealand without any more effort than it takes to arrange a game of euchre.

Here’s how it works:
Grandma calls a local number, which actually goes to a server somewhere, which puts the call out onto the internet directed at my computer. If I’m on my computer, and it’s online, it will ring like a big fancy speakerphone, and I can talk right througth the microphone. If I’m out wandering around New Zealand, or anywhere else really, I can set it to forward her call to my mobile phone, and I’ll pay whatever the local rate is on my end. When I answer, there’s Grandma.
Of course, all this happens in a few seconds, so Grandma doesn’t notice all the switching, and she doesn’t have to listen to any automated menus, or do anything once she’s dialed. All she knows is that she can call a local number and somehow she ends talking to me in a New Zealand grocery store where Julie and I are looking for salsa on the bottom shelf of the International aisle.

Sound awesome? Here’s how you hook it up.
1. Install Skype on your computer.

2. Get an account, and a subscription.
There are usually three to chose from, depending on your spot in the world. Unlimited US/Canada, Unlimited to a specific country, and Unlimited World. Pick whichever works for you, and remember you’ll be calling your own mobile phone from here too.

3. Get Skype To Go, and pick a phone number.
Here you’ll be able to choose a number for the people that will be calling you. I picked one that would be local to my home town. This might not work for everyone everywhere, because this is only available wherever Skype has it set up, but more and more numbers are being added. Chose one that’s going to be cheap for Grandma.

4. Setup Skype Out
If you’ve gotten this far, Grandma can now call you on that local number – but it will only ring on your computer, which is not ideal unless you’re always on the computer. If that’s enough, you’re done.
I set up Skype Out, which rings my mobile number if I don’t pick up on the computer. If you’ve figured out how this works, here is the part you’ll have to pay for, the call to your own mobile. It’s far cheaper than calling direct from overseas tho, and Grandma needn’t know that it costs you a few cents to take her call, otherwise she probably wouldn’t call at all.

The great thing about this setup is that you can log into the Skype web site from anywhere and change which mobile number you’ll forward to. This is particularly useful if you go to another country. So let’s say my phone will roam just fine in Australia, but it costs more than an Aussie phone. I can simply pickup a new SIM card at the airport, plug it in to my GSM phone, and change the number Skype is forwarding to. Grandma still dials the same number, I have a handy local phone to call out on, and my New Zealand voice mails will be there when I get back. If you don’t have a phone that works on the local network, you can just buy or rent a cheap one. The New York Times had a little thing on this in March, which is the same idea. Not only is Grandma happy, but if you’ve got some business contacts overseas, they can reliably dial one number and not worry about where you are this week.

One last trick: if you have a smartphone capable of WiFi there is probably a Skype client for it, which means that you can skip the part where you use your computer as a speakerphone, which is pretty handy as the audio quality is often better on a handset and you can wander the house while you talk like I do. It also means that if you’re near an open WiFi network, and you take the call through the phone’s Skype client, your call will be free. Free calls from your Grandma in Wisconsin to a hostel in Wollongong.

I also looked into shipping, but found that shipping was more expensive still. I even looked into selling this bike and buying a new one, but I like this bike, and I just can’t understand how it was that two bags, within the specified dimensions, were included with my ticket, but should either bag contain a bicycle, it would cost US$200 extra. I decided I’d pack the bike up and take it along as “normal luggage,” ie, not mention the contents and take a chance. In the end my bike and I made it to New Zealand without issue, and without extra charges, but being prepared was the key getting through – and here’s what I did.

1. Disassemble the bike.
You’ll need to get the bike as small as possible. In my case, I deflated the tires, took out the fork, and removed the handlebars. I also removed the chain rings instead of taking the crank out, as removing the bottom bracket or even crank arms usually requires special tools that I didn’t have on both ends of the journey. I have a bike case, but it was already in New Zealand holding my touring bike, so it wouldn’t be any help, and even if had it been around, it’s way over the linear measurements and would certainly give away the contents. Instead, I went down to my favorite bike shop and asked for a cardboard box that new bikes come in, which they happily gave me for free. I spent the next several hours dismantling, re-arranging, cutting cardboard, and generally constructing the smallest, sturdiest bike-box I could with what I had; at one point my pizza needed to be removed it’s box to procure more materials.

My road bike, tightly packed in a cardboard box.

2. Remove markings.
I don’t know how United decides whether you have “a bike in a box” or “a long skinny box of non-bike stuff” but I am pretty sure that a diagram of a bike and a big Gary Fisher logo would give it away, so I taped over or blacked out any bike-related markings. The pictures at right and below show how it turned out.

3. Off to the Airport.
My first cringe came quickly. I grabbed a cab to the bus station in Madison where I’d catch a ride to O’Hare, but as I was loading my cargo onto a nearly empty bus the driver asked me if the box held a bike. Before I really thought about it, I responded “Um, yah?” he replied “oh – well we charge $15 extra for bikes.” Oh man, I hadn’t even gotten out of town and I was already called out – I responded “…er, well, its not a whole bike – its just a frame for a bike, is that extra?” The driver either forgot about the bike thing or took pity on me, because when he came around to collect tickets he only asked for the normal fare. Still, it was a pretty nervous ride, as I figured that if the bus driver could spot a bike-shaped box for an extra $15 then surely the airline guy had gone through some special bike-detection training – plus airports have x-rays, so by the time I got to O’Hare I was convinced that I’d have to pay at least some kind of fee.

My road bike, packed up and ready for flight.

4. Check-in.
I headed into the airport, wearing my backpack, dragging my wheelie bag with one hand and carrying my bike (er, box full of non-bike-related stuff) in the other. I headed into the check-in lane for United Domestic, and before I even got around the first turn of the maze, an attendant pointed at my bike and said “oversize – go to 80/81″ I had to ask what that meant, but behind the normal check-in counter was a smaller counter, marked “Special Services.” I figured this is where they kept the bike-sniffing dogs, and where United would separate me from my money, but at least I wouldn’t have to wait in line. I handed over my documents while he typed and asked the usual questions, until he asked the one I’d been practicing in my head for days: “What’s in the box?” I replied, “aluminum tubing.”  He didn’t even shrug as he stuck one of those long tags onto the box, and had me sign a little form (a very little form, it was the back of the claim ticket) where two check boxes were checked: “Fragile” and “Unsuitably Packed.” My signature below indicated that I wouldn’t be suing United for any damage that the, um, contents, might sustain. I signed, he handed my boarding pass and asked for the next passenger.

5. Fly for 16 hours.
The usual airline experience. The United flight from Chicago to San Francisco is too full, and they’re trying to take my backpack away and stuff it into the hold. I tell them that I’m on a short connection to Auckland, New Zealand and they find a place for it. Change planes to Air New Zealand at San Francisco. The United flight was late, so the gate for Auckland is empty – everyone is on the plane already. I walk up … “Mr Ballweg?” “Yes, that’s me.” “Great, we’re ready to depart, you’re the last passenger – we hope to leave early.”  Sweet as, that’s the kind of Kiwi service I’ve come to expect. I get on and off we go.
I’ve got plenty of time to fill out the various forms, the usual entry stuff and a brand new Swine Flu sheet. I declared that I was indeed carrying “sporting equipment,” and I recommend that you always declare anything you have, as all they do is ask you about it at biosecurity anyway. Don’t declare and get caught with something you should have? NZ$200 instant fine.

6. Re-check / Terminal transfer in Auckland.
Depending on your flight, you may be done. I was off to Christchurch, and I didn’t happen to be on one of those sweet flights that has an attached connection to Christchurch. So I went to baggage to collect my stuff for customs and biosecurity. The bike popped out of the special/oversize area where I retrieved it without incident. The box didn’t look any worse for wear, other than the hub on one of the wheels was poking through the side of the cardboard. I loaded everything onto a free little trolley (or cart) and pushed it towards customs.
New Zealand has had good biosecurity controls, and as a result doesn’t have as many issues with invasive species killing all the native flora, so before I left Wisconsin, I had rigorously cleaned every spot of crud off of my bike, I even got the crud out of the cassette – you could literally eat off of any part of it, so I was prepared for any poking and swabbing that biosecurity folks could imagine. When I got to bio security the guy simply said “Is that a bike?” I said “yes” he asked “Road or mountain?” I said “road” and he waved me on.
I bought a long black went on to check my stuff back in for the flight to Christchurch, where there is one last thing to note: technically, the bike box is oversize for Air New Zealand domestic, but it gets a free pass for being a bike. This is totally opposite of how United does it, so when Air New Zealand asks you “is that a bike?” you’re going to want to say “heck yah it’s a bike!” And off you go to your last flight.

7. Arrival/Reassembly.
Everything made it and a few days later I found time to put it all back together. I’ll say everything worked fine, and my bike is all in one piece. I haven’t found anything to be out of alignment, cracked or broken. I can’t say the paint was unscathed. I suppose, had I taken more time to wrap each tube of the frame in protective cardboard or got some of that foam pipe insulation, it may have made it without a scratch. Then again, I didn’t have a lot of time, I didn’t care to introduce more styrofoam into the world and the scratches aren’t any worse than you’d get from a few months of city commuting. Certainly a single fall does far more damage. So all told, it worked out pretty well, my bike made it and I didn’t have to pay extra.

If anyone else is in a similar situation, maybe with different airlines, I’d like to hear if this works out for you as well.

We purchased tickets with Air New Zealand primarily because of their generous baggage policy. You see, many domestic carriers in the US are no longer including baggage in the ticket price, furthermore, all bikes and many other items are automatically called oversize, regardless of their actual size and weight. Air New Zealand doesn’t play that game, and instead includes bikes and other sporting equipment as a normal piece of luggage. And so we booked our flight with Air New Zealand, from Chicago to Auckland, with a short layover in San Francisco.

There’s just one problem with that,  Air New Zealand doesn’t actually fly to Chicago, so like all airlines, they put you on another carrier for that leg, in this case, United. The problem arises that we are then checking in at a United desk, and United has different baggage policy, where they charge an extortive $200 for each bike you would like to take, and an additional $150 if they go over 50lbs, which is awfully light for a touring bike, case and the bare minimum of camping equipment. Of course, one would assume that if you booked the ticket through an airline, and they put you on a different carrier to ease logistics, that you would be beholden to the ticketing airlines regulations, and not those of the contracting carrier, but I am afraid what will happen at the check in counter. I called United to ask their policy, which is where I first heard about the $350 “service fee.” So I called Air New Zealand to make sure that was accurate. They told me it wasn’t and that I wouldn’t, er, well shouldn’t be charged. So I hung up and hit redial, to see what another Air New Zealand customer service person would say, and she seemed to think that the charges would be permissable, which she verified with her manager. She also seemed to indicate that this wasn’t the first time she’d heard of United assessing extra fees to Air New Zealand customers.

When I explain the situation to friends, almost everyone replies “why don’t you just ship it?” Indeed that is a fine idea, but it is also wrought with complexity, red tape and expense. If you’re considering shipping as an answer to this problem, I’ll save you some time by giving you a quick rundown of the costs involved.

First, a word about our cargo. We have two Bike Pro Cases with bikes, camping equipment and other miscellaneous stuff.
The dimensions are roughly 46″x36″x14″ and they weigh upwards of 100lbs.
We’re still looking into methods of getting our stuff over there, but for anyone considering it, I’ll save you some legwork by posting a rough rundown of what this kind of thing costs.

UPS Worldwide Saver: $2200 (door to door)
Commercial Air Cargo: $850 (inc. $75 Tax-Air to Chicago Airport)
United Airlines baggage charge: $700
Marisol Ocean Cargo (LTL): $430

Right now it looks like ocean cargo is the best answer, especially considering that we’ll still be able to check two bags onto the airplane with us, but remember, ocean freight can take four to six weeks, and if you’re going on a short trip, you’ll have to send your stuff well ahead of time to make sure it gets there. In our case we’ll be there for a few years, so it’ll be worth the wait, but we’ll have to learn to live a life without bikes for a few weeks. If you’re wondering how to arrange ocean freight, you can start by going to FreightQuote.com, which help you find a forwarder to handle your parcel. I found M.E. Dey, a freight-forwarder out of Milwaukee. After a phone conversation, a few emails and a couple days wait, I had a quote for air and sea shipping.

We’re still working out the final details of getting our bikes to New Zealand, even though we’ll be flying in three weeks. I know there are still more issues to handle, such as customs, TSA and getting them from Madison Wisconsin to wherever they’ll fly or float out of. I’ll be sure to post an update when everything is finalized.

Julie and I decided to go the case route. We settled on a pair of Bike Pro USA Race Cases that we found on Craigslist over the summer. Last night was the first time I’ve had the opportunity to try it out with my 54cm Long Haul Trucker. This bike also has wide Planet Bike Cascadia fenders, a Jandd Extreme front rack, and an Old Man Mountain White Rock rear rack which would all need to come along.

This might be the cheapest way to get your bike on the plane, but there are two things to note before you go this route. First is that the airlines have cranked down on the max size of your luggage, so the case still might cost you extra at the terminal; and secondly, some disassembly is required. It’s not difficult, but its worth looking a look at the process below if you’re thinking about buying one.

So, here’s the process for my bike, season to taste, your mileage may vary.

Surly Long Haul Trucker, in a case.

Tools you’ll need.

• Allen wrenches or multi-tool.
• 8mm wrench. (for fenders)
• 10mm wrench. (for rack)
• Tire levers.
• Pump.

Tools you’ll want.

• Grease.
• Chain Lube.
• 6 inches of string.
• Portable work stand.
• 1″x135mm PVC tube.

Packing the bike.

1. Tip: When you remove a part, put the screws back in the holes they came out of, so you don’t forget where they go or lose them.
2. Put bar-end shifter in the in-line position.
3. Open brakes and remove wheels from the bike.
4. Deflate tires and remove tubes.
   (you only need to do this if you really need every last bit of space.)
5. Remove rear rack.
6. Remove rear fender.
7. Remove front rack and front fender.
8. Brace rear dropout with skewer and pvc tube.
9. Tie derailleur cage to chainstay with string.
10. Remove handlebars from stem.
11. Hang handlebars over top tube.
12. Remove headtube cap
13. Remove stem, flip it and rotate it 180, reinstall headtube cap.
14. Drop seat all the way down.
15. Remove pedals.
16. Place bike in case, fork into it’s bracket first.
17. Place bottom bracket on its platform.
18. Tighten fork skewer.
19. Tighten chainstays to platform with T-shaped bracket.
20. Place wheels on either side of frame, in wheel bags.
21. Racks may fit within each other, upside-down, in rear triangle.
22. Fenders fit within each other, through fork with their tops toward the front of the case.
23. Fold tubes and  tires and put them under the rear triangle, or wherever they fit.
24. Toss your tools in there somewhere they wont bang around too much.

Re-assemble.

1. Tip: Tighten screws finger-tight until the part is in place, then tighten.
2. Re-orient stem.
3. Loosely attach handlebar.
4. Attach front fender at fork crown.
5. Attach front rack to lower fork braze-ons, with fender stays on top.
6. Install mid-blade rack bolts, with three spacers between rack and fork blade.
7. Tighten all front rack bolts.
8. Attach rear fender to crossbars between chainstays and seatstays.
9. Attach rear fender stays to rearmost braze-ons on frame.
10. Tighten fender.
11. Attach lower rack struts to braze-ons on rear end.
12. Attach upper rack struts to brake stud mounted brackets.
    (I have an Old Man Mountain White Rock rear rack that attaches to the brake studs, not the rack braze-ons on the seat stays.)
13. Tighten rear rack.
14. Install pedals.
15. Install tubes and tires. (if you took them off)
16. Release derailleur.
17. Install wheels.
18. Stand over the bike, align stem and handlebars where you like them, and tighten  them.
19. Check that your skewers are tight and your brakes are connected.
20. Go for a ride.

I can put the bike together in about 30 minutes if I do it quickly. If I clean and regrease all the bolts, have a coffee or beer to sip, and drop a lot of screws and tools, I can still do it under an hour, which is a little more realistic.