Since we don’t have a car, we walk a minimum of 5 miles per day and about half of that with the stroller.  Our small umbrella stroller, which we loved, broke just before we left for the USA in December, so we brought another one here that we had in storage. Unfortunately with our daughter at the upper weight limit of this new stroller stroller, it is impossible to navigate these treacherous sidewalks and our daily travels are a pain, not to mention increasingly dangerous as the wheels like to get stuck.  Thankfully, we’ve found a great alternative and we’ve picked up a Mountain Buggy Urban Stroller holds kids up to 70 lbs (I will need serious help if I am trying to push a kid that big, bit it’s great for our 33 pound/15 kg 2 year old!). I am so excited!

One thing that we planned for perfectly is a car seat (~that unfortunately doesn’t get much use here). When Geneva grew out of her sweet little baby seat at 9 months, we graduated directly to the Sunshine Kids Radian80 Convertible Car Seat which FAA approved for airline use, the only foldable car seat, and the only one with a steel (rather than plastic) frame. This amazing seat fits kids up to 80 lbs.  No need for a larger seat or a booster, which new studies are finding are not much help in a crash, anyway.

Yes, we bring this car seat through airports and on the plane with us. It’s heavy, but it makes for a well-behaved kid in her own, familiar seat.  When not in use, we fold it and store it in a suitcase.  Can’t do that with any other car seat!

Surprising as it may seem, the Radian 80 also fit rear-facing into the back seat of our Mini Cooper when we were living in the USA.  I wasn’t sure that the combination of a tall car seat and a small car would work, but it did and at 5′-10″ tall,  I could still squeeze into the front passenger seat.

We learned our lesson with the stroller.  Montevideo sidewalks are a beast to navigate and very hard on strollers. Our first stroller had a good run of 9 hard months here.  Kids equipment to purchase new in Montevideo is expensive and many times not the best quality. Plan ahead and purchase in advance (before you get to MVD) when looking for the big items necessary to travel with babies, toddlers and even older kids.

We had previously looked into animal shipping companies that can handle all of the paperwork and logistics for you- including providing a crate for the animal and grooming before departure. These are door-to-door services, and as such, have a hefty price tag. We were quoted between $3500-4500 to ship the two dogs separately from us. We decided for that sort of price, we could go through the steps and handle it on our own.

Our first questions for the airline involved the crates: We had two plastic dog crates, one large that can hold both dogs and one small. We would have loved to put both dogs in the larger crate together since they are always together and really quite attached, but it was against airline regulations. Dogs have to be the same breed and under 6 weeks old to be allowed in the same crate for international travel. Our pugs were 8 and 6 years old at the time of our travel to South America, so that plan wouldn’t work.

/>We sold our larger crate and went out to look for another small crate that would be more comfortable for a single dog and easier to transport. We found a great Bargain Hound crate that is perfect for airline travel.  Not only was the Bargain Hound crate sturdy and a perfect size, it had the following features:

• Lockable wing nuts to secure the top and bottom together (some airlines require this)
• Ventillation holes on all four sides
• Carrying handle
• Enclosed door pegs- some brands have the metal ends of the door latches exposed on the top and bottom of the crate, creating a potential danger for pets and children.  The bargain hound crate had this enclosed for safety.
• Zip tie holes to secure the crate door during travel.  The agent at the airline check in will do this for you.  The bargain hound crate had dedicated holes for the zip ties, our other crate did not.
• Pet travel kit with international travel stickers, water bowl and zip ties

We brought one crate to the airport for a dry run the weekend before our projected departure to make sure all of our questions were answered and there were no unexpected surprises.  I highly recommend doing this when you have pets and so much luggage.  The airline also appreciated it because they could make a note in our record of our discussions and expect us to take a while upon check in.

We packed the crates with a folded ‘mattress’ of fleece blankets with a towel as the core.  I figured this would keep the dogs warm when leaving MN and the towels would provide some absorbency in case of accidents. It worked perfectly. On top of each crate, I duct-taped a gallon size ziplock bag which contained the dogs leash, two meals worth of food in a smaller ziplock, a few extra zip ties in case the dogs had to be removed, a small water bottle to refill the bowls during transit and another ziplock bag with copies of all the dogs paperwork.  The top of each crate also had the international travel information sticker and the dogs name written in permanent marker.

We arrived at the airport the day of our departure to find that the check-in agents were waiting for us.  We had our own dedicated line for check-in and it was very much appreciated.  The agent asked at check-in if we were interested in a short-check for the dogs and we had never heard of this before.  Since we were flying from MN to Chicago, Chicago to Miami, Miami to Montevideo, we could check the dogs for all or only a portion of the journey.  Our longest layover was in Miami and since that was almost halfway according to the overall transit time, that would make the most sense for a short check.  We could claim the dogs in Miami, walk them and have them out of the crate for a while, then re-check before our flight.  We opted to check the dogs all the way through to avoid the stress on their part (and ours) to have to put them back into the crates for another check-in and long flight to Montevideo.

After all of our bags and boxes were weighted and tagged, it was time to take the dogs for a final potty break and get them packed up.  After I removed the dogs from the crates, a TSA agent came over to inspect both crates and bedding. I took the dogs to their approved area outside the entry (who knew there was such a distinction?) and came back to find the inspection completed and the agents ready to seal the dog crates.  One last kiss to the pups and in they went.  The crates were zip-tied, water bowls filled and away the Pugs went.

We all traveled safely and securely- and were reunited in Montevideo.  The dogs were happy to see us and anxious for a potty break and food.  Thankfully there were no messy dog crates, which I had feared.  We hired a truck at the airport to transport us and all of our things to the hotel- and our adventure in Montevideo began…

Next up in the “Dogs in Uruguay” series: Dog culture in Montevideo, licensing and the cost of dog food.

I’ve been corresponding with a woman from the United States who was looking for info about a possible move here with two kids. I wanted to include a few excerpts from our email conversation regarding the most expat-friendly neighborhoods and costs of goods/services in Uruguay.

Thanks for the note! To address your questions about the Pocitos, Punta Gorda and Carrasco neighborhoods:

We love the Pocitos/Punta Carretas areas. They are considered higher end, safe and very expat friendly areas that are still close to downtown. We live on the border between the two “barrios” listed previously and are within walking distance to just about every service and store that we could want. Cabs and public transportation are excellent, so we have no problems in this area without a car. There are a lot of high rises in this area and nearly all the buildings are attached to each other. While we know of a few people with small yards here, it does not seem to be common. Our house does not have a yard. Instead, we have a small front garden and a back patio.

Carrasco is gorgeous, with big houses and large yards that feel more like any United States suburb. You would definitely need a car in Carrasco it is around a 15-20 minute drive from where we are living (on a good day with no traffic). Punta Gorda is one barrio/neighborhood closer to downtown Montevideo than Carrasco and from what I hear, it has a similar feel to Carrasco.

If you click on Google Map Montevideo, you will see the names of the different neighborhoods (you may have to zoom in) and you can get some perspective to their relationship to one another. The little pin on the map is between Punta Gorda and Carrasco. If you follow the coast to the left you will find Pocitos and next to it at the point near the bottom of the screen, Punta Carretas.

To address your question regarding items that are less or more expensive than the US: Cars and gasoline here are very expensive, as is most technology including computers and home electronics. Kids/baby stuff here is also extremely expensive (2-3x more than what you’d pay in the US). I just looked for a potty seat for my daughter at a local shop and the only decent one I found was a Safety 1st model that is $50 here but only $23 on Amazon.com. On the flip side, food, most services, child care and medical are all much cheaper than what we experienced in the US.

The lifestyle is definitely different in Uruguay. We love it but we also know people here who are having problems adjusting. They expected it to be more like the US or Europe, I guess. With such a small market in Uruguay, many consumer goods are not the quality that you’d get in the US and the imports are insanely expensive due to all the import and sales taxes. Plan trips to Buenos Aires or the US to get anything you can’t find here. While you technically could ship anything here, there is a very hefty price tag attached!

Good luck with your decision and feel free to email with any more questions-
Lisa

If you have any specific questions and would like to email us directly, please use the ‘Contact’ link at the top right of the site, or feel free to leave a comment on this or any of our posts. Thanks!

I’ve been using this service since Mozy launched several years ago.  It’s saved our butts more than once and provides peace of mind for $4.95/month.  We use the MozyHome version for PC’s (there is also a Mac version). There’s a business version called MozyPro, but for most users, including business users, MozyHome is the better option based solely on the cost benefit.  You pay more per backed up gigabyte with MozyPro and you don’t get many extra bells and whistles.

An example of how Mozy saved our butts: A few years ago, one of our staff inadvertently deleted an entire client profile of data which we didn’t realize until a couple weeks after it happened and we needed it…now!  Thanks to Mozy we were able to download all the files back to the desktop into their original location with nothing more than a couple clicks. It takes some time to download a lot of data back to your computer, but at least you can recover it.  (A few minutes for several files…maybe a couple hours if you have lost gigabytes.)

These were problems that we had before we found ourselves as expatriates. Now imagine, you’re in a new country with an uneven power supply (Uruguay is pretty good btw). What if you have a power surge, flood, or the humidity finally says this is the end of the line for your computer? Well, Mozy is a small investment that even the most technologically challenged retiree or baby boomer will be able to manage with no trouble.  If you have any issues with Mozy, shoot me an email or if you’re here in Uruguay, lets meet!

Your backups through Mozy also include various versions of files.  If you’re old school, still use Word and wanted to go back to a saved version of a file from a month ago, you can pick any day to restore that file to.  We’ve had to do this and it’s really fast since the file is small.

OK.  Major crisis mode.  You hard drive completely crashes.  You’ve never done that back up that you’ve been meaning to do for months…ahem…years.  All of your photos and documents are gone!  You could pay a service $1000 to try to recover your data and if you’re lucky, you might see some of it again.  Maybe.  See this story about the Miracle on the Hudson. In the case that you ever lose your entire hard drive, like the article, Mozy will FedEx your data on DVDs so you can reload all of your data.  That’s not going to be cheap, but be happy that within a few days while abroad (next day in the States) you can be back up and running.  You’ll be without that precious music and photos for days…not forever. There are several other reasonable ways to back your data, but this has been the easiest for us.  As I said, get Mozy.

Next up in the Expat Travel Technology Series: TV.  There are cool things you can do to watch your favorites shows while on the road or living abroad, but some tricks to make it work.

RingCentral

We currently have three VoIP services with our primary service being RingCentral. RingCentral offers a hosted plan. It’s very easy to set up and you don’t need any hardware other than a computer and a headset.  RingCentral has a “softphone” panel that appears on your computer screen, looks like the face of a regular phone and operates in most ways like a regular phone.  You can use the softphone from a laptop on the road over WiFi or 3G wireless card. It also allows you to send and receive faxes from your computer by either attaching a file such as a pdf or scanning your page right into the program to be sent off.   Like many VoIP services, you receive your voice messages and faxes via email.  I have tried Packet 8, Vonage, and efax. They are all fine service, but RingCentral blows all of these out of the water.  It is comprehensive. You can route calls to various extensions if you have staff or contractors in other parts of the world and can all have US, Canadian, UK or other global phone numbers. It has a very simple interface and even works on your iPhone as a calling app. My clients can call me from anywhere in the world and have no idea that they’ve reached me in Uruguay unless I’ve told them. I called a client in Kazakhstan the other day on my RingCentral line to his Vonage line dialing a local US phone number. Call quality was great. I have yet to drop a call with anyone (I actually had more dropped calls in the States than I do here…weird).

There are many plan levels for RingCentral.  The cheapest starting at US$9.99/mo.  I have opted for a middle of road plan that includes a Linksys IP Phone.  It’s a regular business class phone that sits on my desk.  The call quality is excellent.  It’s more stable than the softphone that I mentioned earlier.  If you’d like to order the phone from RingCentral, you’ll pay anywhere from Free-$100 depending on which service plan you go with.  They also have a plan that includes unlimited use and four business IP phones with individual numbers for $99/month.

RingCentral comes with my highest recommendation if you’re an expatriate that requires a business class solution. If you already have business numbers you’d like to keep, you can port them over no problem. Would you like an 800#?  You can pick between 800, 866, 877 and 888 for free.

Skype

Of course many people know Skype.  I use it regularly to call vendors and clients in other countries. If you’d like to give it a shot–you can download Skype. With Skype I can have video conferences or simply use it as a phone (again you need a headset with microphone or a WebCam for the video features).  There are Skype Cordless WiFi phones that you can use in your house as well and can be purchased through various online and retail outlets.  I’ve not purchased the cordless but had considered this option.  Skype phones come in several versions. Some require a computer and some do not. Check the details.

Skype is a fee based service to call regular phone lines and a free service to have video calls and/or voice calls with other Skype users.  If you never need to call a regular telephone–you won’t pay a cent for this service.  Just get your family, friends and clients set up with a camera and show them where to download Skype and you will be up and running in no time.  For the younger set this is very easy to set up.  If you are not exactly best friends with your computer, you might need a hand from your 11 year grandson or granddaughter.  I referred this to one gentleman that has 90+ year old family members in various parts of the United States.  They can’t travel as easily anymore and Skype has allowed them to see family across the country and around the world with the free video chats.

MagicJack

Finally, now that I know the service, a MagicJack.  The commercials and the website are really cheesey and it seems too good to be true, but this little thinga-ma-watchit really works and is a perfect solution for someone that needs a cheap solution that works great.  You just plug MagicJack into your computer–it installs some software–you type in your confirmation info, and then plug in a standard corded or cordless phone and you’re set.  It dials like a regular phone.  Once you pay your initial $30 or $40 bucks you have free calling to anywhere in the US, with inexpensive calls around the globe.  We opted for an additional 5 years of service so we paid about $100 in one shot.  Now we have free calling to family and friends.  We also use the MagicJack in case one of our other services not working.  Your voice messages can be picked up from your phone or via email since a small VM file is emailed to you.   I have also set up an email rule to forward to Lisa’s email as well so we both get messages on our computers.  We treat the MagicJack like a land line with no payments in our case for 6 years.  It’s free for family to call and they don’t need anything special to do it.  Just your new phone number.  At the time, I’m writing this you cannot move a current phone number to the MagicJack, but I understand that feature is coming.

There is so much more to say about phone and VoIP technology.  I’m not covering many different other possibilities.  Just know that you can communicate with just a little additional cost.  In fact, you are probably going to pay less than you were at home, because you’ll be ditching your land line and expensive cell phone plan in favor of one of these simple and inexpensive services.  VoIP is one of the greatest, and most important tools to any expat.  Shoot me some questions for anything that you’d like me to expand on.  I’ve tried to keep this simple.

So now you’ve eliminated the bulk of your mail. What to do with the rest? In our case we receive the remainder of our postal mail through an online scan and mail forwarding service. We started this about 6 months before we left with a company called Earth Class Mail (ECM). ECM receives your mail at a PO Box, then does an initial high resolution color scan of the front and back of the piece of mail. This scan is then emailed for you to take action. Scan what’s inside, Recycle, Shred or forward via FedEx to another location. The service is great for sorting mail. You have copies of all your mail in PDF form that you can save to your computer or it can be archived on ECM’s site.

We’re self employed as many expatriates are. We still received paper checks from clients and vendors, which is another issue. I wish everyone just did ACH/direct deposit, but they don’t. One of the many tools that ECM offers is “Deposit Check”. After scanning your mail you may deposit a check with a click of a button into a Wells Fargo account. I had to establish a new account with Wells Fargo to make this happen but it beat having to worry about sending checks to family for them to deposit on my behalf. For a small per check fee I can deposit online in just one step.

To be honest the set up process with Wells Fargo was long and painful. It took nearly two months for the account creation and testing. I believe this was due to it being a relatively new service at the time of my set up, but be prepared. Wells did cover the cost of my checks (which I may not use since I live in Uruguay, but still) and waived account fees for the first couple months.

I love ECM. I love receiving mail online. If I return to the States I will continue this service. It just simplifies things too much for me to give it up. They also license the technology throughout Europe with Swiss Post (addresses available throughout Europe). It’s great if you’re a road warrior traveling for business 4 of every 5 days of the business week or just don’t want to deal with all the junk. With Earth Class Mail, junk mail is almost all gone and if I do get it,  I hit the recycle button. I’m kind of a hippie too and this is a fairly green way to deal with your mail. You’ll have a much higher percentage of your mail recycled and a much lower percentage of garbage mail making it to your virtual door.

With ECM, you still have a physical mailing address to select.  There are many PO Box locations to choose from as well as several street locations.  If you want to be virtually in Manhattan…bam!  You’re there.  (Or at least your mail is there). If you’re only receiving personal mail, a PO Box will location will probably work for you. Since we receive business mail, it complicates matters when vendors will accept nothing but a street address. We pay a small additional fee to have a street address in Seattle (instead of a PO Box). This still wasn’t ideal for us, though, and we decided to have an additional address set up with a UPS store in Minneapolis. Twice per month our UPS Store automatically forwards all of our personal and business mail that is not already directed to our ECM location in Seattle. ECM receives it and upon our instruction they open the Priority Package from UPS and “induct” all of the individual pieces of mail as though they had been sent directly. Many probably won’t require this extra step but ECM just didn’t have an address in Minny so we felt if was necessary for us to maintain our presence there. They have addresses in most major cities and  are adding more all the time.

There are several other ways to get your mail. You can DHL or FedEx regularly to your new foreign locale. Or in the case of Uruguay, you can try a service like Miami-Box. Have your Amazon and other packages shipped right to the street address of Miami-Box and they in turn will bring to down to Uruguay and deliver right to your door very quickly. There are high fees and duty to worry about, as well as certain items that can’t be shipped but it’s a service that’s worth taking a look at.  We also employ the minions that read our blog to courier items down to us.  Not a bad practice!  If you have family or friends coming down, have them take a trip to Target or Costco to grab some of your favorite items.  But I digress… 

Earth Class Mail : Receive PDF files of all your mail online. Sort, save, recycle. Very simple, very easy.

There are many challenges in moving abroad.  One is technology.  What do I bring? How will it work?  Will it work at all?  Do they sell that in Timbuktu? If yes, do I have to give up my first born to get it?  The answer to that last one is…maybe.  Technology abroad–for the most part–is expensive.  

Tech–as it’s always been–is a blessing and a curse.  There are an incredible number of options, but at least we have options.  I give Lisa’s mom a hard time for coming over on “the boat” in the ’50s from the Netherlands.  They actually flew with several stops, including one in Greenland. Either way, it was no picnic.  So even if my computer crashes or my VOIP goes down…I did not have to come over on “the boat”.  Again, options. We can communicate locally and internationally even if that means I have to walk down to the nearest restaurant or McDonalds with WiFi (wireless internet) if my Internet crashes.  WiFi is even available in the parks here in UY and some buses  I’ll have to try that albeit discreetly –if that’s possible– as I don’t want my computer to be relieved from my possession.  You can even sit down at the McCafe and have a “meeting” across the table via webcam.  So you can continue those Starbucks-style meetings if you like.

One challenge involves staying in contact with your “home” country.  For some this may not be an issue if they are severing ties to the homeland.  In our case, we need to work with clients in the United States to allow us to maintain our expat lifestlye and keep up with family.  Thankfully it has never been easier to maintain this connection as an expat.   Even three or four years ago this transition was far harder than it is today.

There are many issues to consider: receiving postal /snail mail, personal and business phone, computer hardware, backing up your computer, power supplies, what technology to bring, watching your favorite TV shows from home, hiring developers or independant contractors. Fortunately there is a tool, a download, a website, or a physically piece of equipment that can address all of these issues. Even if you’re a baby boomer retiring abroad and technology is not your best friend, there are still many tools that are worth the small investment.  I will provide information on several of the travel technology tools that I use everyday in Montevideo… many of these we were using well before the move because they’re just great services. The technology we use untethers us from a physical location and thereby is perfect for a traveler on the go or an expat…well…that’s flat out gone. 

I’m sensitive to you Mac folks…I have not yet joined your ranks, but most of these tools play nice with Mac…probably better.  

I will also talk about some of the challenges of limiting the interuption to my business while navigating the set up process in a foreign country.  There have been pleasant surprises and of course headaches.  I will share it all here.  I may not be able to wait until Monday…there’s so much good stuff!!!

We have been recently corresponding with a couple who will be moving to MVD shortly with their daughter. They’ve asked great questions about traveling abroad with a baby and what to bring, and we’ve responded with our experiences thus far.  Another couple with a little girl just commented on this blog yesterday (what’s with all the baby girls? They’re the best, I know. But baby boys are portable too!) and I thought this would be a great time to publish our very extensive baby packing list.  

Whether you’re moving to Uruguay, the UK, Australia or UAE (or wherever in the world your journeys take you) this list should help to plan out your move with a child.  Appropriate for birth to 2+ with some minor modifications, this is what happened to make the journey with us. 

I had been planning this packing list since shortly after Little G’s birth.  We visited MVD to scope things out in March 2008, when Geneva was 3 months old) so I could really get a feel for what is available here and what is not. After talking to people here last year, I found that baby stuff in particular is not the quality that we are accustomed to in the US.  I wanted to bring as many things as I could that were portable, good quality and will grow with the baby.  I also brought a bunch of small stuff that I knew I could probably get here, but didn’t want to worry about going out and finding it right away. I regret absolutely nothing in this list. Here goes:

If you have traveled or moved abroad with young babies/toddlers, we’d love to hear your ideas and what has worked for you.  If we become friends via the blog and you’re coming in this direction, be warned. We just bay ask you to bring something from our wish list!

* Note: All of the links above are Amazon because in preparing for this move, we hopped on Amazon all the time when there was something that we needed. We heart Amazon and are “Prime” members so we got free shipping in 2 days on most items.  Plus, there are reviews of all the products so you know what you are getting.  Brad had a good time practicing his HTML skills placing code for all of those links!