Upgrade Tank Before Or After Move? / Would My Tank Need To Cycle Again

[Doomchibi]

At the moment I have a 20 gallon long and a 29g that both are waiting on upgrades, and I can't decide if I should upgrade them now or after I move about 4 1/2 - 5 months from now. I am planning on upgrading my 29g to a 55g, and the 20g to a 75g. I already have both tanks, filters, heaters etc but have not started cycling them as I was not sure if I should wait to use them or not. At first I was thinking it would be easier if I moved most of my stuff along with the new tanks, and got those set up and then came back for my fish and transferred them over with as much media, substrate etc as possible and hope my tank doesn't have to completely cycle all over again.. But now I am wondering if it would be a better idea to cycle my larger tanks now and get the fish going in them so I wouldn't need to change filters, gravel etc and could possibly save some water from them for when they were set up again..? 
 
One big problem is that I am moving 13 hours away and it would be difficult to keep all the bacteria alive that long. Would a good enough amount survive if I kept my plants, decor, substrate, media etc in water from the tank in closed tubs with air stones running in them? 
 
It seems like both have risks, upgrading later could end up with 2 large uncycled tanks with fish, and upgrading now would mean longer moving time for the fish since I would need to quickly set the tanks up for them when I got there. I do not have anyone that could keep the fish for me for any length of time- how long it would take if I were to come back for them after I got new tanks set up (maybe 2-3 days) would be the maximum.
 
I could possibly add some bottled "instant cycling" bacteria to the tanks if I needed to, but usually they don't work for very long in my experience. It always seems to end up as a temporary cycle.
 
Which do you think would be the better option?

 

[Ch4rlie]

If this was me, I'd wait until the move to upgrade and transfer your stocking to the larger tanks when you've set it up in your new home.
 
If its possible at all, try to get these new tanks set up at the new place before you actually move, so that things would be ready for your stocking to go straight into new tanks without any further delay.
 
Bacteria will easily survive 13 hours without any problems at all, just keep it wet in old tank water for the duration.
FYI decent bacteria can easily survive over a week without ammonia, they will just go into a dormant state and may take a little while to revive them up again is all.
 
Just as long as you put in the all the old filter media into the new filters and gravel and decor would help a little bit as well as these will contain a small amount of bacteria.
 
You may go into a mini cycle but should be done quickly as long as all of old filter media is used on both tanks, just a case of keeping a close eye on water parameters for the first week or two.
 
A bit of careful planning and working things out in advance will pay dividends.