The Arrival........Day #12 - Container Arrived!

Up early in anticipation of the container arriving. Went to the shop and got more water and soft drinks for the crew, just in case.

My phone rang and it was one of the crew, asking the best way to get to the villa. I had previously sent marked up map with the best route for a 40' container on a truck, but this had not been passed to the delivery crew.

The guys arrived in the village, and I could see the van at the bottom of the hill from the balcony. The phone went again and I went down to meet the guy, this was just the crew and not the container, so I drove round the two routes so they could see the options, and agreed that the route I suggested was the best.

They crew came up to the villa and waited for the container coming. The also contacted their office and requested a big forklift with basket, to make the job easier getting everything into the villa.

The customs officer was the next to arrive, and everyone just had to wait for the container coming.

I was watching from the balcony and did see a container truck go past on the main road in the village, but if it was it, it missed its turn! Sure enough about 15 minutes later it was back again, and this time it founds its way up to the villa.

They checked through the paperwork, seal numbers etc. etc. there was a lot of discussion, so don't know if there was a problem, but just left them to do what they needed.

Then it was time to break the seal and open the doors....

The road outside the villa is quite steep, and they were concerned that the angle could mean things could fall down while unpacking, they wanted to turn the truck round.

Fortunately the truck managed to drive up the hill a bit and reverse back into another junction and turn. We had to get the neighbours cars parked on the road moved out of the way. Anyway, truck into position, and crew now happy. Just in time for the forklift to arrive and the unpacking to commence.

The customs agent informed me that she would just be randomly opening boxes to check contents as the crew unloaded.

As each box was checked off the inventory grid, I had to work out where it was going, and they loaded the forklift accordingly, top, middle or bottom. With each load, the forklift went up the driveway, and to the relevant balcony, where the crew would offload over the handrails into each floor.

The container was empty by mid-afternoon, the crew worked non-stop to empty. The customs agent left, and once I had checked the container was completely empty, the truck left.

The crew took a break for some food, and then spent the next couple of hours unwrapping all the big sofas and kitchen and dining room tables/chairs.

When it came to the piano, it was a bit of a brute, but they got it in and assembled. There was a few heart stopping moments....but they did well, and no dropping from the 1st floor.

This was all I wanted them to do. They took all the packing material away that was from the unwrapped stuff.

Now it was over to me.....chaos for the next few days! 229 packages in total to get through.

By 11.30pm, I had had enough and was ready for my bed, still not tackled the bedroom furniture yet, so another night on the airbed for me.