folks,
i am working on my first trip to RSA for august of next year. i finally got the dates booked, and am now looking at booking award travel on united.

one option is Ethiopian air, with a return of luftansa (for the smallest amount of points).

i will be taking archery equipment only.

is there any issues connecting for a short layover anywhere, specifically germany with archery stuff?

thank you

I flew through Frankfurt to Windhoek in 2012 with archery gear without any problems, but things may have changed since then. I have read not to go through Amsterdam with broadheads.

I went through Frankfurt as well in 2012 with 3 other friends bow hunting,,, the only issue was that they put the bows with the guns that were on board and it took asking a lot of questions and a lot of talking and opening cases etc to get them out of baggage and on to Air Namibia for the next leg,, I was glad then I had 12 hours layover to find and secure our bows. As you can imagine,,, workers at the airport were not concerned with getting our bows to us in a timely manner,,,,

did either of you use a travel service?

i actually just booked my flights with my dad on the phone so he got the same ones. on the way home we'll be flying through Frankfort.

How did you track down your bows? i would've thought it was just a normal layover... i do not travel internationally very much, so this is all pretty new to me.

is there any issue with packing my bow in the middle of a duffle bag?

I would not travel with Ethiopian air.

Too many people traveling from South Africa to Saudi Arabia I know had luggage lost flights cancelled.

Do not be penny wise pound foolish when it comes to traveling.

with regards to the packing of the bow see below

http://forums.accuratereloadin...8121043/m/4351047402

Hi,
archery gear is legal and can be bought without license. You can take it in our out without any problems.

Dennis

We booked through Lori Ginn with Travel Express. She specializes in Safaris but is much smaller than Gracey Travel or Steve Turner. She did a great job for us. We checked our baggage from Denver directly through to Windhoek so we didnt have to pick up our gear in Frankfurt. I packed my bow in the bottom compartment a rolling Badlands duffel surrounded by all my clothes and it worked fine with no problems. It doesn't look like a gun case so it stays with the regular luggage.

thanks MT, that's what id' like to do. did you wrap your bow in anything, or just padded it real well with clothing? i would think if i removed the stab and sight there wouldnt' really be much to worry about. mark the rest locations in case something gets bumped, and let it roll. no issues with broadheads being packed away in a little box or anything?

I removed the stabilizer but not the sight. I packed clothes tightly around the bow filling in all gaps with about six to eight inches of padding on the sides. Sight pins were all accurate both in Namibia and on returning back home. I read about this method on Bowsite.com where there are lots of traveling bow hunters. I disassembled the broadheads and packed them in a separate plastic box and placed that in the rolling duffel. The badlands rolling duffel has a fairly hard plastic back.

I booked with Steve Turner, Travel with Guns,,,, I always use a service when on a hunting trip due to possible permits and rules and regulations. I am an experienced traveler[ multiple million mile flier] and do my own domestic travel but when headed to Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Argentina, etc I use Steve Turner.