Shipments done by Travellers

The company now offers crossings three times a week; Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday

No matter which option one opts for one has to go to the port the day before the departure for paperwork.

Sunday and Tuesday the crossing is made with a RORO ship (Roll on Roll off). It was earlier not officially opened to regular customers but used to ship used cars from U.A.E. to Iran. It is now again used for regular shipping. Very easy to ship cars or motorcycles with this option, be careful to keep an eye on how they tie down your bike though as they have little experience of this. The ferry leaves in the evening, no precise time, and arrives early in the morning. One is to show up no later than 3 p.m.

Thursdays the crossing is made by a catamaran. The ship leaves in the afternoon and arrives in the evening, so much faster than the ferry option. Presumably it takes a mere 4 hours. There is no room for cars but they do accept bikes which are lifted onto the back of the ship. One is to show up no later than 7 a.m.

In short:

Paperwork no later than day before departure.

Sunday & Tuesday: RORO, leaves at night - arrives in morning.
Thursday: Catamaran, leaves in afternoon - arrives in evening.

Just an update on Girag. My buddy and I shipped our two V-Strom 1000´s and it was pretty easy and simple. I had emailed Girag a few months ago and never got a response, but after reading here and on advrider.com about the process, we decided to go for Girag first and we just showed up unannounced. When you head out to Tocumen Airport from Panama City, just look for the signs to the cargo terminal, you have to drive all the way around the airport to get to it (the old passenger terminal is now the cargo terminal). Anyway, on Monday we got to Girag (it´s on the right side of things next to Fedex) around noon or 1pm. The lady we spoke with said the earliest flight we could get would be the next day, Tuesday, and we would be able to pick up the bikes Wednesday morning in Bogota. She said to come back the next day at 9am with US$800 cash plus a little extra for a weight surcharge (which ended up being $26). (Side note - at this point since we hadn´t paid anyone any money we went to a few other places at the cargo terminal to comparison shop, Copa Cargo said they wouldn´t know for a few days if they were even going to ship bikes anymore, another guy said he worked through or with Girag and couldn´t get us on a flight until Wednesday, and a few other places said they couldn´t do it unless we had an agent, so we just went the easy, if possibly more expensive, route with Girag) Luckily Panama uses the US dollar, so we hit an atm that afternoon then again the next morning ($500 limit on atm withdrawls per day in our experience). So the next day we went out with the bikes and the normal paperwork (passport, title, whatever) and fistfulls of cash. Everyone was nice and relatively efficient at the office, it took maybe an hour and a half before they were done with us. Bikes actually had about a half tank of gas each and we didn´t disconnect the battery. For that matter we had a small propane tank for our camp stove - basically they didn´t have the keys to the bikes or our panniers so there was no in-depth searching or checking done. I asked about the strapping down and such, and the guy who was going to do it told me they do it all the time and not to worry about it, so we didn´t. We took stuff for the next two days and they pushed the bikes into their warehouse. We even decided to leave on our non-locked dry bags.
Next we had to get the paperwork done with the aduana (customs). This is where the waiting began, because they´re not really set up for people to be out there without their own transportation, and we had just surrendered our bikes. I had to catch a ride with a truck out to the front of the airport to get the paperwork stamped (it´s like a mile or so), then I got a cab back to the cargo terminal to get several other stamps by some people who somehow seemed to not know what they were doing (maybe because of a new computer system), but after another hour or so we were done, and I had asked the cab to wait so we got a ride over to the passenger terminal and got tickets on the next flight to Bogota, around $400 per person, but we paid maybe $50 extra for business class which were the only seats left on that flight, because we would have had to wait like five hours and we wanted to check out Bogota.
So the next morning around 9am we went to the Girag receiving office at the Bogota airport (which, as you approach the airport, is on the left side of the highway, not the right, which is the Girag sending office). The bikes were there, but we had to clear them through the aduana first, for which we had to go back to the other side of the freeway, at the second ¨bay¨ after the one where the Girag sending office is, the sign says DIAN (again, not really set up for people without transportation so I would suggest having your cab wait for you if you don´t want to hoof it). It took a while, needed to get copies and such as usual, but as always when doing this sort of thing smiles and thanks and patience go a long way. Once we had our paperwork sorted, we went back to the Girag receiving office, the bikes were in perfect shape, everyone was super nice and helpful, we rode the motherfuckers down the stairs and we were out! Peace and thanks HUBBers for helping us plan!

Costs as follows:
Ticket (bike & 1 person):

Superb service from Wendy Choi. Large choice of shipping destinations. Be aware that you have to pay the bill in cash.

Pretty helpful guy, even remeasured our bike to try and get the cost down, ended up getting us to reposition the boxes, remove the screen and wing mirrors (didn't realise that the cost was derived by volume!).

The cost broke down by the following based on our bike volume of 2.16m3 (all US$):

Freight - 324.00 (150 per m3)
Wharfage - 10.80
Bill Of Loading Fee - 30.00
BAF (Fuel Surcharge I think) - 54.00
East Timor Tax Based On Freight - 8.55

They also tried to charge us US$30.00 for a customs inspection, don't pay it, basically all you have to do is take your bike (or car or whatever) to the customs office get them to stamp your carnet, they will then fill out a form and then if you pay for a taxi they will go with you to wherever the container is that you are sending your vehicle in and confirm it is placed in the container and seal it up. I think you have to tell SDV that you are going to do this and it will then only cost you a few dollars for the taxi fare for the customs guy.

The actual freighting company is called Perkins and their sailing schedules are on their website http://www.perkins.com.au (look under Commercial - Schedules - International Schedules).

Oh yeah, also nearly forgot to say, if you are needing to clean your vehicle take it to Tiger Fuel (just up the road (heading out of town) from East Timor Backpackers). I think they can clean it there for you but we paid Tony and did it ourselves (he is located in an office out the back just ask anyone there and they will point you in the right direction).