Moving/Shipping advice?

[darinm]

Does anyone have any tips they would like to share with me on moving/shipping gear over long distances? I'm getting ready to move across the continent (Portland, OR to Montreal, QC) and I'm trying to figure out the best way to get my gear from here to there in one piece without costing me a fortune.

I'm not driving and I'm not bringing enough of my possessions to justify paying for a professional moving service, so my only two options are either sending things through the mail or taking as much as I can with me on the flight. Realistically I'll probably have to do a little of both.

Does anyone have any insight into which airlines might be the most friendly to musicians with a lot of gear? Any particularly good (or bad) experiences to report?

I'm most concerned about the two keyboards I'll be bringing with me, my Alesis Andromeda and Nord Modular G2. They are probably the two largest, most fragile, and least replaceable bits of gear I have so I want to make sure I get those right. I have a sturdy flight case for my Andromeda although I don't yet have one for the G2 (suggestions on a good case would be most welcome). I'm not sure if it's a good idea to take these with me on the plane or not, although I suspect it'll cost more to ship them and perhaps it'll be nearly as likely that they'd be damaged in the mail as they would be in transit on the flight.

Any advice? Maybe I'm more worried about all of this than I need to be, but I'm a bit scared by some recent horror stories I've read...