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Tents and camping equipment

Tents and camping equipment

Old Sep 8th 2004, 11:13 am
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Default Tents and camping equipment

Did anyone take any tents or camping equipment to Australia when they went.
We really like our tent and would love to take it for future use as we only purchased it about 12 months ago, and have only used it five or so times, due to weather and work commitments here in the uk.
If so did you clean it before taking it?
Could anyone please give me any tips or ideas.
Karen & Dean
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Old Sep 8th 2004, 11:22 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by jaycat
Did anyone take any tents or camping equipment to Australia when they went.
We really like our tent and would love to take it for future use as we only purchased it about 12 months ago, and have only used it five or so times, due to weather and work commitments here in the uk.
If so did you clean it before taking it?
Could anyone please give me any tips or ideas.
Karen & Dean
Yes any boots etc also need to be cleaned perfectly. Someone put a post out a few months ago how they had cleaned all their gardening kit with a certain product and labelled it all as such and is passed customes no problems I believe. But yes if things aren't perfectly cleaned the will be cleaned etc there at your cost I believe....
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Old Sep 8th 2004, 11:33 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by jaycat
Did anyone take any tents or camping equipment to Australia when they went.
We really like our tent and would love to take it for future use as we only purchased it about 12 months ago, and have only used it five or so times, due to weather and work commitments here in the uk.
If so did you clean it before taking it?
Could anyone please give me any tips or ideas.
Karen & Dean

Hi Karen and Dean

We sent ours off in the container on Friday. Luckily it wasn't too dirty as we only bought it in June and had also only used it about 5 times. We washed it over a bit and gave the tent pegs (which were far dirtier) a good clean and wiped them over with Jeyes fluid as a disinfectant.

We used PSS and as I'm sure all movers do, they gave us a form to fill in where you have to list how and what you did to clean items such as bikes, lawn mowers etc. We listed how we cleaned everything, what disinfectant we used and whether things were steam cleaned or power (jet) washed.

We bent the truth slightly with the tent in that we didn't actually power wash it but I think its possible that they may fumigate it anyway however clean it was.

Bye for now.

Sam
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Old Sep 8th 2004, 3:43 pm
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Thanks for the replies so far, any one else care to add there views on taking tents to Oz.


Dean & Karen
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Old Sep 8th 2004, 10:25 pm
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by jaycat
Thanks for the replies so far, any one else care to add there views on taking tents to Oz.


Dean & Karen
We brought ours with us on the plane it was wrapped around a tool box in one of the holdalls Just clean the pegs in jeyes fluid and wipe the groundsheet with a mild detergent. Most Ausies have never heard of Jeyes fluid and when I was asked by customs if I'd cleaned the tools in the box I said yes with jeyes fluid got a blank look and was through.
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Old Sep 9th 2004, 3:33 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by cresta57
We brought ours with us on the plane it was wrapped around a tool box in one of the holdalls Just clean the pegs in jeyes fluid and wipe the groundsheet with a mild detergent. Most Ausies have never heard of Jeyes fluid and when I was asked by customs if I'd cleaned the tools in the box I said yes with jeyes fluid got a blank look and was through.

Customs aren't the main problem, its AQIS ( Australian Quarantine Inspection Service) that you have to watch out for especially if items are in a ship container. You will find that they are MORE picky than customs, which look more for illegal "contaband" than stuff that will infest the environment. Be careful that there are no seeds etc in the folds of the tents or they will irradiate it, not fumigate, as they were going to do with Pollyana's hat (with FAKE flowers in it). This may damage the material the tent is made out of.
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Old Sep 9th 2004, 4:08 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by jaycat
Thanks for the replies so far, any one else care to add there views on taking tents to Oz.


Dean & Karen

We have a tent that we only used a couple of times in tha UK and I cleaned it with disinfectant. It wasn't even inspected!

The thing I was wondering about was the type of tents they use over here! Ours has 3 "bedrooms" which seal right up, but the main part is just like a roof and all sorts of creepies could get under and in!!!

Would this be a problem or am I just being paranoid?!

A relative of ours got chased round a campsite by a wombat once when he tried to move it!! In the middle of the night in his boxers!!! :scared:
 
Old Sep 9th 2004, 4:35 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by jaycat
Did anyone take any tents or camping equipment to Australia when they went.
We really like our tent and would love to take it for future use as we only purchased it about 12 months ago, and have only used it five or so times, due to weather and work commitments here in the uk.
If so did you clean it before taking it?
Could anyone please give me any tips or ideas.
Karen & Dean

We brought ours with no problems and without cleaning it specifically for teh move, but it was already clean thanks to being good at keeping it tidy during use...

I would suggest getting a small, domestic, steam cleaner to do your shoes with and try to use that for the tent as well, being careful not to be too close to it to take off the waterproof layer ...
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Old Sep 9th 2004, 4:39 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by The Bloke
Customs aren't the main problem, its AQIS ( Australian Quarantine Inspection Service) that you have to watch out for especially if items are in a ship container. You will find that they are MORE picky than customs, which look more for illegal "contaband" than stuff that will infest the environment. Be careful that there are no seeds etc in the folds of the tents or they will irradiate it, not fumigate, as they were going to do with Pollyana's hat (with FAKE flowers in it). This may damage the material the tent is made out of.
With customs, it just depends, they really looked very closely at my golf shoes and didn't bother at all with my husband's. If you have golf clubs they have to be cleaned too (we nearly forgot).

Can't advise on the tent - we bought all our stuff here - we are new to camping.
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Old Sep 9th 2004, 5:36 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by jaycat
Did anyone take any tents or camping equipment to Australia when they went.
We really like our tent and would love to take it for future use as we only purchased it about 12 months ago, and have only used it five or so times, due to weather and work commitments here in the uk.
If so did you clean it before taking it?
Could anyone please give me any tips or ideas.
Karen & Dean
We bought loads of camping stuff with us - three tents, ground sheets, etc etc...we took them all into the garden and washed them down with damp cloth and shook them all out, made sure there was no mud/other stuff stuck to them. The tent peg thrown in a bucket of hot soapy water and wiped off.

To be honest we did not do any more than we usually do when cleaning our stuff for camping (cause then it lasts longer ).

Possibly the rules have changed in the last two years but we did not bother with Jeyes or cleaning every pair of shoes apart from outdoors hiking and golf shoes which had a soapy water wipe.

I personally honestly believe they pick on a container and give that a super once over - it is not possible to check every container coming in. They also check a list and pick out one or two things, in our case it was a lawnmower they took away and charged us $250 to get it cleaned 'properly' - what utter tosh, we had cleaned that properly cause it was husbands pride and joy and he wanted to ensure it came in. They took the mower but did not take the grass box part - as I said in my opinion a money scam - mates of mine had a charge of $100 to clean a christmas decoration (they said no worries bin it) and they only got charged $30!

So my advice is for a decent sensible clean to get rid of all mud and I am sure it does not hurt to have the 'smell' of Jeyes about for affect.
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Old Sep 9th 2004, 5:55 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

They can be fussy buggers sometimes.
We took our tent through the airport once. Customs took it away, sprayed it thoroughly and returned to us dripping wet!!
What do you do with a unpacked wet tent in the middle of an airport?
Grumble grumble...
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Old Sep 9th 2004, 6:36 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by JulesandChris
They can be fussy buggers sometimes.
We took our tent through the airport once. Customs took it away, sprayed it thoroughly and returned to us dripping wet!!
What do you do with a unpacked wet tent in the middle of an airport?
Grumble grumble...

You could have put it up & when they looked amazed said "well I need to dry it!"

Bye
Mark
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Old Sep 9th 2004, 6:43 am
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Default Re: Tents and camping equipment

Originally Posted by jaycat
Did anyone take any tents or camping equipment to Australia when they went.
We really like our tent and would love to take it for future use as we only purchased it about 12 months ago, and have only used it five or so times, due to weather and work commitments here in the uk.
If so did you clean it before taking it?
Could anyone please give me any tips or ideas.
Karen & Dean
Our stuff is being shipped next week, we are taking our tent, we just bunged it in the washer, slung the pegs as were filthy, just buying new ones out there.

It's been used once this year due to this stinking weather

No more weather threads please!!

Walla
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