diff --git a/caldav/__init__.py b/caldav/__init__.py
index 319a6eaa..433da774 100644
--- a/caldav/__init__.py
+++ b/caldav/__init__.py
@@ -11,6 +11,7 @@
         "You need to install the `build` package and do a `python -m build` to get caldav.__version__ set correctly"
     )
 from .davclient import DAVClient
+from .davclient import get_davclient
 from .search import CalDAVSearcher
 
 ## TODO: this should go away in some future version of the library.
@@ -29,4 +30,4 @@ def emit(self, record) -> None:
 
 log.addHandler(NullHandler())
 
-__all__ = ["__version__", "DAVClient"]
+__all__ = ["__version__", "DAVClient", "get_davclient"]
diff --git a/caldav/lib/url.py b/caldav/lib/url.py
index 9feff4ae..44728d1d 100644
--- a/caldav/lib/url.py
+++ b/caldav/lib/url.py
@@ -189,7 +189,7 @@ def join(self, path: Any) -> "URL":
         ):
             raise ValueError("%s can't be joined with %s" % (self, path))
 
-        if path.path[0] == "/":
+        if path.path and path.path[0] == "/":
             ret_path = path.path
         else:
             sep = "/"
diff --git a/caldav/search.py b/caldav/search.py
index c8b4a942..e037790f 100644
--- a/caldav/search.py
+++ b/caldav/search.py
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+import logging
 from copy import deepcopy
 from dataclasses import dataclass
 from dataclasses import field