Moving household plants to St. Croix

Wow....I don't know if you CAN, but I wouldn't - our stuff got held up in PR for almost a month to be inspected...it's a pretty sure bet in a metal container they won't last very long...besides, you'll want all island tropicals when you get settled!

I moved two plants, but they were a really odd species (elephant's foot or tortoise plant) that was amenable to being without water for weeks (or more). Built special crates, put them in my pod, and now they're thriving.

I doubt that regular foliage would hold up to the move. Maybe you could contact a local nursery and see where their plants come from-- perhaps you could piggyback your plants with one of their orders if their plants ship from Miami or thereabouts?

Contact danieljude once you get to St. Croix - I think he has about a gazillion orchids and native island plants and special species stuff he's brought in - he will give you the gardening bug and he's right by Gallows Bay. He has plant sales but will sell to you just whenever...you can reach him by email at affiliationllc@aol.com Good luck with your move!

Thankyou,

You have been real helpful. Gosh I hope our stuff doesn't get stopped in PR for that long. What did you do without all your things?

It can easliy happen. I always think of puerto rico as the black hole when traveling (flying), mailing or shipping. You never know how long your or your items will get detained there. As for what you do if you already have a house or apt you buy an air mattress and buy a few other house hold goods to get buy. But honestly half or more apts are furnished, alot of people dont ship all of there stuff because of the expense.

Lived on an air mattress with a card table and two folding chairs. It was not fun.

I will second Betty and many others. Don't bring your life's possessions...they won't hold up well and they just don't work on island. There's always someone moving out that has a sale, or moving in that may have something left over. We could have saved ourselves a whole lot of money and headaches if we'd listened to what everyone tried really hard to tell us. Remember, Customs and the Ag Dept. can pull ANY container for inspection, and we were told it can take from 3 to 30 days. Ours fell at the outer limit of that, then our stuff was forgotten and left sitting in the transport yard. It was a huge headache to sort out, and I ended up sorting it out...all I was told was "everything is fine, don't panic".....after 6 weeks without my stuff, believe me, I was in a panic since no one seemed to know where it was or what had happened to it. Incidentally, we just discovered this week that our air conditioner seems to have sprouted legs while on the container and while the door was open, it walked away. Be on the lookout for a walking AC unit somewhere along the route - point it in the direction of home if you find it....

There will be a once-over on your container and if it is chosen for the "You Are Special" Inspection, not only will it slow things down, but most likely your plants won't make it through AND you get to pay an arm and a leg for being special. My advice is to save yourself the grief.

What moving company did you use?
We are wanting to get a 40ft container so we can bring a vehicle--it is brand new and american made. Can we put some things inside the truck and keep it locked?
As far as our things we are liquidating alot.

You could have pounds of cocaine in there. If they cant open it they will drill your lock.

Newone, please PM me if you really want an answer to that question...

No, nothing in the car anymore that would obstruct the vision of the driver, since your car will have to be pulled out of the container and inspected. They limit you quite a bit as to what can go in the vehicle. On the way down I was allowed some pictures - on the way back our movers put our lawnmower in the back end of my Cherokee - upside down - and all the oil ran out. I'm sure that didn't make me very popular with Customs...may have been why we got held. My car is still a mess.

If your car is brand new and not paid for, please make sure your lienholder will allow you to bring it to the VI. Some won't. And you have to surrender your keys to the movers, unhook your battery, and make sure there is less than 1/4 tank of gas when the vehicle is loaded.

We used Crowley to ship our household goods to STX from Virginia in 2005 and it took about a week to get here. Our container was not opened or inspected. We evaluated using a 40' container to ship our household goods and a vehicle but the $1600 difference in cost between a 20' container ($3500) and a 40' or 45' container ($5100) was more than the cost to simply ship the vehicle separately. Getting the vehicle in the container is not as easy as it sounds since they do not come with a ramp and the quoted fee for the container only includes a 2 hour loading window, assuming you are the one doing the loading. In addition, our vehicle was about 17' long, so once a bulkhead is built to separate the household goods from the vehicle, you only have about the equivalent of a 20' container for the household goods anyway. Our prices were based on transporting the stuff from Virginia to Florida and then shipping to STX, We used Crowley for the container and Seastar Lines for the vehicles. We were lucky that we went with the 20' container because there is no way the trucking company could have gotten a 40' container up our driveway here, which is something I had not considered. It still took the driver about an hour to get the 20' container into our driveway.

We packed everything up ourselves and staged it in the garage. I hired 2 guys to help me load the container and it still took us almost 4 hours to load it. The back of the container is about 4' off the ground so there is a lot of lifting involved in getting your boxes and furniture into the container. We sold or gave away our potted palms because I thought they would be pretty inexpensive here. However, the palm you can buy for $25 at Home Depot or Lowes in the states will cost you $75 to $100 here if you can find it.

Things have changed considerably in the 12-18 months with regard to inspection - but JE's info about bulkheads and how much actual space you have is excellent. It just took a couple of weeks for our stuff to get to St. Croix - coming back was a nightmare. When leaving stateside, we got a tow truck with a lift to come by for $20 and put the vehicle into the container, where it was blocked and tied in the bulkhead, battery disconnected, etc. Leave the keys in the front seat so it can be offloaded if needed. And, as JE stated, be aware of where you are moving on island.....some containers can't be taken to some places and they have to offload your belongings and then truck them to you, costing even more.

If you're going to STX, check wtih Danieljude about the cost of palms and things - much, much cheaper than Gallows or some of the other places.

The nursery by the university was $22 for any type of fruit tree you want. They had 4 different mango's lots of palms carambola and just about anything you could want $22 each.

Thankyou-- I will look into seperate ways of transporting our vehicle and our household things. I really don't think we need 20' container for our things but our truck in 20ft' long. Should I ship them seperate?

I have alot of potted plants(a small investment) so I am going to ship them with our things and hope. Tropical plants can be on the edge of death and still be revived. I'll give it a try.