My perfect move from USA to Europe with UPakWeShip. (except the kitchen mixing bowls)

I used a U Haul and loaded at the terminal as we lived down a dirt road.

Expat in Europe….. my perfect move from the USA except the kitchen mixing bowls.
Working for an international moving company does not offer a lot of extra benefits ( apart from, talking to and meeting very interesting people of course and the satisfaction of a happy customer and a job well done) but one of the few perks is that if you need to move overseas yourself, it’s not going to cost you!
With that being said, I decided to sample as many UPakWeShip services as I could.
We decided we were going to rent a furnished place when we arrived in Europe, so early on we chose to not ship our furniture. Well not all of it lol!
Knowing it was going to be cold in Holland when we arrived in December, and coming from Charleston SC which was still reasonably warm, the first thing we did was send a U Crate 50 way ahead of us with winter stuff so it was there to be picked up when we arrived. We loaded The U Crate 50 with suitcases and bags and had a good selection of sweaters, hats, scarves, coats and shoes which we collected from the warehouse within a few days of our arrival. This allowed us to travel with only one suitcase each which was great as we were stopping off along the way to visit friends and family.

Loading up the U Crates

The rest of our things, which was not a lot I had originally thought, like kitchenware, (except the kitchen mixing bowls apparently) pictures, photos, office things, files, more clothes and my keyboard and electronic drums managed to fill up Three U crate 100,s That plus a UPakWeShip Pallet service for a bed in pieces and a memory foam mattress still in its original box.
The day before we left for Europe, we sent a couple more suitcases on UPakWeShip’s air service with some last minute items. They arrived within a week of our arrival so all in all we had plenty of warm stuff and were surrounded in bags and suitcases in our little Air b and b.
Our U Crates and Pallet were all loaded in our UPakWeShip consolidation container and we, like every other customer were kept up to date with shipping information. Unfortunately the ships route over the Christmas period took longer than usual which just goes to show just because you are the boss doesn’t mean everything will be perfect. Our shipping container was on a ship doing the rounds and not getting over to Holland for nearly 4 weeks. This did put us above the average 4-6 weeks transit time but what can you do? Just fyi there is no point shouting at anyone in the office or the shipping line, the captain isn’t going to change his route just because my stuff is on there, it’s just one of those things that happens once in a while and the best way of coping with the situation is accepting it is what it is and just deal with it.
My back wasn’t so happy on the blow up mattress but we survived and before we knew it our u crates and pallet arrived, cleared customs and were delivered.
All in perfect shape, no damage, no rough handling, nothing missing, well except the kitchen mixing bowls that somehow I must have forgotten to pack and left behind.
No worries though as they can come in the UPakWeShip self load 20 foot container that has yet to be organized as we ended up renting an unfurnished place!

Our U Crates, ready for loading into a container for shipping.

Yes I’m definitely getting my money’s worth with UPakWeShip, but I must say, I much prefer packing everything up myself, all the services were perfect for our move to Europe and what could be better than a testimonial saying you received all your treasured belongings in perfect condition.

Delivered to our new place in the Netherlands

I am going to be 60 next month but I didn’t have a problem packing everything myself.
Two recommendations, don’t pack the boxes too heavy, 2 small boxes are better than one heavy box and don’t try and do too much at once, just pack a few boxes and items up every day.
Happy packing, you can do it and you will save lots of money with UPakWeShip.

Dutch tailgate delivery
Birds eye view of the delivery!
The perfect move to Europe!
No Comments

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.