Shintaro packing for the UK

No, he's not emigrating nor going on holiday to the UK, but tonight around 1000 Shintaro Koi were packed for shipment to the UK.

It was way back in April that the guys from UKNishikigoi purchased the whole Koi house of tateshita at Shintaro, a couple of thousand of them.  Half of them were shipped a few months ago, the others have stayed in the Koi house continuing to grow, and some have grown significantly.

Saito san, assisted by his cousin Masaki Aoki from Takezawa - http://www.niigata-nishikigoi.com/node/82 - started packing the Koi at 6.30pm, the truck due to arrive and take them on their journey to Narita at 9pm.

Even in the half light in which the Koi were being packed, and in a bowl containing 100's of Koi, one caught my attention immediately.  The Showa below was one of my favourites way back in November 2008 when the 1st picture was taken, you can read more here - http://yamakoshi.blogspot.com/2008/11/good-headache.html.  Maybe Tim will keep it and grow it on for me!

As always it's a family affair at Shintaro, as it is at almost all breeders across Niigata, Hiromi-san taking care of completing the packing, adding dry ice packs to the boxes before sealing them.  Whilst the plane and lorry may be temperature controlled the boxes are likely to spend time sat on the tarmac at both Narita and Heathrow.

There were also 5 boxes of larger Koi being shipped, Kensuke Saito helping with the bagging of them.

In just 90 minutes 40 boxes of Koi were packed and ready awaiting the lorry which rolled into Mushigame exactly at 9pm.

In no time at all we had the boxes labelled and loaded on the truck to start the 330km or so journey to Narita airport.

Tomorrow morning the boxes will depart on a Virgin Atlantic plane for Heathrow, it will probably be 36 hours before they reach their final destination of UKNishikigoi's premises in St Helens.

Hopefully Tim will send us some pics of their arrival in the UK to complete the story of their journey.