Traveling With Pets? Read This First
The UK has made it incredibly difficult
Having pets makes traveling a lot harder. Especially by plane.
It is impossible to fly pets into the UK
I recently made the same mistake twice while trying to fly with my dog Ginny and my cat Sierra.
At Christmas, I booked flights from England to France and back with Luftansa. We had planned on bringing our pets with us.
However, when we called the company to reserve spots for our pets, they informed us that they were happy to transport them from England to France but did not accept pets on their flights from France to England.
We ended up driving to France and back and lost our tickets.
I was baffled because this information was nowhere to be found on their website. Eventually, through a number of internet searches, we found a list of airlines that did not accept pets on inbound flights to the UK. The list included Luftansa.
Therefore, when it came time to book flights for a trip to France this summer, I made sure to pick another company. I chose KLM. I scoured their website to make sure that the flights I had selected would work. I checked that the transit time was long enough but not too long to allow our pets to follow us. Everything seemed in order.
Not wanting to repeat our previous experience, I decided to call the airline before booking to make sure I had not overlooked anything. When I called, they informed me that they were happy to transport our pets from the UK to France but did not accept pets on their flights to the UK.
In fact, after ample research, the only option we found to fly our pets into the UK would be to have them travel as cargo with British Airways. When we asked for a quote, we were asked for almost 3,000GBP (about 3,800USD).
There are very few other options
Considering that it is impossible to fly with pets into the UK, we have looked for other options. There are very few. In fact, there is basically only one option. You have to drive.
The passenger ferries and trains between France and the UK do not allow pets. The only way to cross the English Channel with a pet is in your car, either on a ferry or through the Eurotunnel. With both options, your pet has to stay in the car the whole time.
If you do not have a car, unfortunately, I have no solutions to offer. I have heard of some companies that might be able to transport you and your pets across the Channel but I don’t know how expensive they might be.
Final thoughts
If you are planning on bringing your pets to the UK, make sure to do thorough research first and call the airline because the information might not be readily available on their website.
For our trip, I will be flying down with our pets and my husband will join us later by car. We’ll then drive back home to the UK. It’s not an ideal solution but it is the only one we have.