Have Dogs, Will Travel

Planes, planes, planes

Fin all loaded up and ready to fly!

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We’re back from our whirlwind adventures, and I’ve been getting a ton of questions like “How’d the dogs do on the plane?”, “Hotels were ok with the dogs?”, and “What were the competitions like?”, so I thought I’d hash those all out here, in a multi-part series on being an international dog traveller. In this first installment I’m going to deal with planes, trains, and automobiles. Actually, mostly just planes, since we didn’t take any trains, and renting cars is just like the US (except smaller and with more stick shifts).

Booking Flights

For those of you who haven’t met him in person, Fin is a big Border Collie; he’s nearly 22” at the withers, and weighs in around 45 lbs. Needless to say, he does not fit in an approved cabin carrier, and I refuse to pass him off as a service dog for a variety of reasons (1. it’s morally wrong, 2. he barks at strangers, 3. there’s barely enough space for me on these airplanes, let alone sharing leg room with his big butt for 8 hrs). So cargo travel was always on the docket from the get go. The biggest piece of advice I have there is: do your homework on airlines. There are tons of blogs and reviews available online, and these airlines are responsible for the life and well-being of your canine companion, so don’t skimp out just because of fees or less convenient flight times.

We flew on Lufthansa and SAS, and both companies were great with our 4 legged companions. Each airline has their own way of doing things, but generally they only have enough space for a certain amount of dogs, so you should call them to ensure the flight you are looking at has space before booking your tickets. You’ll also need to book passage for your pupper over the phone, and you pay their fare at the airport.

Navigating the Airport

It’s no easy feat to get your pup, your luggage, your dog’s crate, and yourself from the curb to the check-in counter. Fun fact - Fin’s extra large dog crate is too big to fit on most luggage carts with luggage. Also, trying to push said carts, while holding the hand rail down to keep them rolling, and keeping a hold on your pupper, who may or may not be weaving back and forth to avoid / investigate people and items requires an advanced degree in Biomechanics. So for your own sanity, I strongly recommend using a luggage porter / skycap if they are hanging around. For just a few extra bucks, they’ll deliver you and all of your items right to the check-in counter, usually bypassing the line.

Check-in and Boarding

Plan a ton of extra time to check-in….like 45 mins to 1 hour…no for real. Even if you’ve already checked in the human part of your flight, you still need to drop your bags which takes about 10 mins. The rest of the time is spent paying for your pup’s seat, getting them checked in, and then getting TSA to appear and check your crate. TSA will bomb / drug test your crate, likely pulling all of your bedding etc. out of there (so your dog can’t be pre-loaded), then watch you load your dog. On our travels, they zip-tied the dog in most times (3/4), so pack something in your checked bags to cut the zip ties at your destination. Then, baggage porters will come load up your pup and wheel them away. JFK actually allowed us to walk with our dogs to security, while most other airports just took them at the desk. Under NO CIRCUMSTANCES would I head to security myself without seeing my pupper taken away from the check-in counter. I can’t think of a worse thing than for them to have been forgotten there.

One quick side note on porters - they don’t work for your airline, they work for the airport. So you can do all this research finding an airline to treat your pup well, but the porters who pick your dogs up at check-in, and drop them off at baggage claim are totally outside of their purview. You might see some interesting things like: strollers etc. stacked on top of your dog’s crate, or a porter thinking they can manhandle two 60+ lbs dogs and crates onto a single tiny cart. In these cases, I like to opt for a polite but forceful “Those crates won’t fit on that cart and will take 2 of you to lift”. They usually change approaches pretty quickly, but if not, you can always sit on the crate and demand for them to handle your pet in a more careful manner.

Once you are pet free, you get to relax until boarding time. You can try to find your gate and sit there to see if you see your dogs get on the plane, or you can take my route, which is to get a glass of wine to numb the stress of the check-in process. Every time we boarded a flight, we then asked the steward(ess) to let us know when the dogs were on board. SAS was awesome about this, finding us in our seats and letting us know proactively. With Lufthansa, we usually had to follow up ourselves, one time, even standing in the aisle as the plane taxi’d away from the gate, so that we could get confirmation our dogs weren’t sitting on the tarmac. Key learning - don’t be afraid to be pushy.

Elevators

I had to give these their own section because they are LITERALLY the bane of my existence.

A lot of airports are multi-level, and have escalators instead of stairs. So be prepared to pop your pup in and out of elevators multiple times before you even get out of the airport. Also fun fact, many of said elevators are glass enclosed because people think they’re cool. Your pup on the other hand, may not think it’s so cool to suddenly see the ground racing away or rushing up to meet them. In those situations, it’s extremely helpful to be able to put your dog in a down between your legs; it lowers their center of gravity, making them feel safer, and keeps them from bolting out the second the doors open.

And just to make things more fun, most European elevators are tiny….like barely enough space for you and your luggage cart tiny. So having a dog that will willingly squish themselves in a tiny box with your cart, lie quietly while the Earth moves beneath their feet, and keep their tail in so it doesn’t get stuck in the door is a huge bonus. Oh, and don’t expect your crate to be able to fit through the door of said elevator, so have fun playing Tetris while the doors are trying to close on you (and might actually succeed! Just ask Stef!) and your dog is trying to bolt away from the scary death box.

No, I’m not bitter about elevators at all.

So we’ve gotten you and your pup booked on a flight, checked-in, boarded, and hopefully you didn’t get trapped in an elevator. Stay tuned for the next installments in my series on exploring cities with your pupper, and big learnings from competitions and trainings abroad!