Will be leaving end of Oct for the Omay and have a one night layover in Joberg. I'm scheduled to stay overnight at Afton House for the next day flight to Vic Falls. Did I read correctly, that if you check your baggage and guns thru to final destination, you do not need to retreive your guns from customs bond and fill out the SAPS form. I recall the change was made about 1 year ago for transite thru South Africa and baggage checked thru to final destination. Am I correct in this assumption?

375ej

Regardless of what you CAN do I would advise you to retrieve your guns upon entry into RSA and go through the SAPS process. Afton House can assist with this. It is worth a little hassle and some dollars to know that your guns etc got checked onto the flight to Zim. If you check everything through from the US to Zim, do not retrieve your guns and baggage upon entry to RSA and then you do not have your guns arrive in Zim the following day you don't know where they might be. Where as if you get your guns/luggae in RSA and check them on to the Zim flight and still don't get them you at least will know where they are.

Mark

Mark is absolutely right on this one. We will be overnighting at Afton in Joberg on Aug. 29th and will be picking up our bags there. First we want to know if they arrived from the USA, second we don't want to leave the luggage at the airport overnight for the thieves to ramsack (It's bad enough if the bags are there a few hours), thirdly we will recheck the bags for our trip to Moz in the AM and will be able to physically see them loaded.

Checking bags straight through to a final destination seems like the simple way to do it, but creates all kind of nightmares if something goes amiss.

Larry Sellers
SCI Life Member

+ 1

Mark has it right!

Amen, Mark. I always pick up my bags and guns, go through SAPS and head on to Afton House. Louie has a great big walk-in gun safe there and things are fully protected.

I was in africa in late august, throught sept...hunting in Namibia and traveling in RSA. We left out of Dallas on a Thursday, arrived in Joberg on Friday at 6pm, and were scheduled to fly out 930 saturday for Namibia. All along we were supposed to be able to check our bags (aka gun cases) all the way through. United/SSA when we were checking in refused to store/forward to final destination them saying since we had a longer layover than 12 hrs, we had to take them with us. So get the gun permits pulled anyway, I was fretting the entire time, bc I had set up this trip for a group of my friends, and you can imagine how hard it is to get everyone to fill out papers and return, so it didnt happen. Fortunately, the gun permit office was empty bc it was so late in the season. Afton took care of us after that...love them!

We are flying through Jo-berg on the way to Windhoek on British Airways and their "partner" Comair. Into Jo-berg at 07:00 and out at noon. Bags can be checked straight through. No need for SAPS in anyone's opinion right?

Mark is correct, take your guns to Afton...

Also be sure your SA SAS permint covers the day you will be leaving back through SA as well.

quote:

Originally posted by Frostbit:
We are flying through Jo-berg on the way to Windhoek on British Airways and their "partner" Comair. Into Jo-berg at 07:00 and out at noon. Bags can be checked straight through. No need for SAPS in anyone's opinion right?

No need to obtain the permit in your case. Just make sure agent correctly tags your bags with final destination reading - WDH - Don't forget to advise BA in advance of your firearms details.

Have a great trip

Thanks Steve!!

You CAN check your guns straight through to your final destination, but I would never do it. Rather than take the risk of arriving at your hunt without your guns, just get the SAPS permit, retrieve your guns and recheck them the next day. It doesn't make the risk go to zero, but it does reduce it significantly. And, in the unlikely event that your guns didn't actually acompany you to JNB from the states, you'll find that out at the best possible time -- at JNB, rather than at your final destination.

I may be cynical, but I don't trust the JNB airport bureaucracy even a little bit.

I agree with Mark on this one. In fact, even if you are going straight thru JNB, consider the fact you might miss a connection, either coming or going.

I sat next to a Delta flight attendant on my first leg to DAR last month. She told me about a hunter who misconnected out of Windhoek and had to overnight. Could not retrieve his firearms, as he didn't have a permit. He never saw those guns again.