So you’ve decided to move to Curaçao and now the question of how to get your dogs to the island is next on the list. This can be complex, and full of obstacles. If you have a dog under 20 pounds, you can probably bring it on board in a carrier and place it under the seat in front of you. But what if you have a bigger dog? What if it is a short-snouted breed? What if it’s considered a “dangerous” breed. (Note: my toothless chihuahua, Uncle Guido, is without a doubt the most violent, aggressive animal I’ve ever met, so I’m not sure how they define “dangerous,”, but he isn’t on the list, and they allowed him in business class, so I question their methods!!)

The following was written by one of our awesome C4C members (MB) and describes her experience:

“Due to the size & breed, (2 Dogo Argentino Mastiffs), there proved to be very few options to get them down to Curacao.

First, we had to make sure our dogs’ particular breed was allowed entry into Curaçao. Every country is different and has their own set of rules regarding importing animals.  I emailed the vet department in Curaçao to ask just to be sure. They responded quickly that we could bring our dogs and gave me the official list of what the requirements were for entry of pets. (attached at the end of this article)

Next, I looked on various airline websites that would allow animals to fly out of Toronto.  The problems that then arose were that:
 1. My dogs were too large for the largest crate allowed on most airlines and
2. Because they were considered a “dangerous” breed they needed to have an extra reinforced crate.  Plenty of questions arose such as:  Where do I get those crates? How much are they? How long do they take to order? Everything we needed was happening in such a short timeline for us it seemed we were running up against the clock.

I contacted The International Pet and Animal Transportation Association (IPATA) to inquire about moving my dogs to Curaçao. I was told that a lot of people leave from Miami with their dogs as the flight is shorter and the time it arrives its not too hot for the dogs to deplane. I was given a name of a place in Miami to contact. The place in Miami and they could get us custom made crates. Still wasn’t convinced that leaving from the US was the way to go plus with our schedule it didn’t look like that could work.  

The other option I was told by one of the IPATA contacts was quite the opposite. It was to fly with KLM because they can handle bigger dogs and bigger crates. Fly from Toronto to Amsterdam (6hr flight) and then Amsterdam to Curaçao (9 hr flight). Those are long flights for a regular person but way too long for the dogs! I know both my dog’s personalities and this would never work.  Letting them fly my dogs for that long was just unsettling and I knew they wouldn’t do well through that process.

What were my options to this point:

1. Drive to Miami with the dogs, get custom made crates and fly from there
2. Get custom made crates and fly Toronto to Amsterdam & Amsterdam to Curaçao
3. Get a dog transporter to take care of the logistics to get the dogs there & alleviate my stress of getting the dogs to Curaçao myself.

 We didn’t particularly want to drive to Miami to leave from there. Also, even though we heard KLM was great for transporting animals, we didn’t want to do 2 long flights either.  

I started to contact animal transport companies. I ended up coming across a dog transporter based in Ontario called CWEL Transport who travels worldwide. Codie quickly responded and communication was excellent and best of all he would handle the logistics to get the dogs to Curaçao and see which route would be the best for the dogs to travel.

He decided that the dogs flying from Buffalo with a few stops along would work best. Next was both dogs getting a health check before departure at our vet in Canada. Because our dogs were also flying through the US, we needed them to get health checked also at a US vet for USDA approval.  As of August 1, 2024, dogs will also need a CDC document completed to enter the US.

Health checks were done at the vets in Canada and the US, approval was obtained from the USDA and the dogs were ready to fly! My dogs arrived happy, healthy and stress free with Codie transporting them and I am confident that was the best decision we made to get our dogs to Curaçao.  Easily one of the best decisions in our move from Canada was using Codie as our dog transporter!”

That was MB’s experience and it was eerily similar to ours. We had one dog to transport that was too big to come with us on the plane. Air Canada is no longer allowing pets in cargo to Curaçao, and Westjet only flies for part of the year. We looked into cargo shipping, but we would have had to drive to New York or New Jersey, then fly on the airplane with our dog as cargo. This is not the same as your dog flying in the cargo hold as “luggage”. The costs were going to be high, and the extra travel for all of us was not optimal. We also considered driving to Florida, but by the time we drove thousands of miles, got multiple hotels, meals, gas, documentation, etc., the cost and time were prohibitive.  We, like MB,  also looked into animal transport companies. Everyone we spoke to agreed fully that CWEL Transport was by far the best option. We contacted Codie and the rest is history. He got our super nervous boy, Banjer (a Westpointer originally from Curaçao) down to the island with no trouble. They were best buddies in no time. The constant communication from Codie, with pics of happy Banjer, snuggling his new friend in hotels and airports made us feel so happy with our decision.

It was not the cheapest way to get our boy here, but it was the best, by far. We did not second guess our decision to go with Codie and CWEL for a minute. I can’t recommend them enough; professional, responsive, no BS, and the most important part, they are the ultimate dog lovers. We have referred several people to them and they were all thrilled with the results.

If you are planning to bring your pets to Curaçao, make sure you know the process, and plan ahead. Planning is key!

(Note: This photo above is what our boy, Banjer, looked like when the amazing people at CARF found him, and why we support that rescue with such vigor.)

Contact Info for CWEL Transport:

Curaçao’s Entry Requirements for your pet: