Anyone taken their pet abroad?

A question about : Anyone taken their pet abroad?

This is going to sound mental but here goes.

My brother is getting married and the wedding is in his finances home country which is in the EU. My granny is invited but won't go anywhere without Calin, her Lakeland terrier. Calin is 9.4Kg and is about 32 inches nose to tail.

We have looked into the PETS scheme and looked at airline policies - it seems Calin would need to fly in the hold but gran is convinced that it will be cold and he'll freeze to death.

So the other option is to take Calin on the channel tunnel but Eurostar won't allow him on the train!

My other half is willing to drive me, gran, Calin and our dog (who will be a registered medic dog so won't have as many restrictions for travel) and go through the channel tunnel before going into Belgium where the wedding is. As neither me nor gran can drive we will stay at a few hotels along the way and make a holiday of it.

Has anyone done this before? Both dogs are good travellers as they get taken up North every year to visit family we have on the Islands.

I'm worried about re-entry to the UK. How do you find a vet to administer the worming treatment? Is the passport difficult to manage?

Best answers:

• I've not taken a pet abroad, but friends have. I'm not sure how they found a vet to do the worming for coming back into the UK. I can try to find out for you.
  In regards to flying, the hold has heating, so whenever animals/pets are transported, the hold is heated to a nice comfortable temperature. Having said that, I'm not sure I'd take my dog on an aircraft. All my friends who've taken their dogs abroad have gone by car.
• Google English speaking vets near the reentry p0 point and make sure you plan to spend enough time after the check up and treatment ( Iirc its more than twenty four hours and not more that 48 hours. Alternatively you can book a vet anywhere along your route. Just phone and explain ask if they will provide the service and make an appointment. And plan your journey accordingly. I say English speaking, but of course, you may well not need one.
  You could do drive from Belgium to channel tunnel in one day though, and there will be English speaking vets there.
  Also, when is the wedding, do you have time to get the dog passported? It takes a good while.
• The wedding is the first week in September.
• It's a fairly straightforward process we quite often take our dog with us when we head over to France and Belgium on long weekends.
  How long are you planning to stay in Belgium for, the tapeworm treatment window is 24-120 hours so if we're heading over for less than 5 days we have the treatment done before we head over there, which means no messing around with vets while we are there.
  Both Belgium and France are a lot more dog friendly than the UK, you can take you dog into virtually every pub and cafe and also some supermarkets and restaurants
• I have taken a dog abroad but not for quite a few years. I travelled on Eurotunnel as that is a quick journey and your dog is with you the whole time unlike the ferry where you have to leave your dog in the car for the couple of hours of the crossing. This year alone quite a few dogs died because they got too hot on the car deck so I would never risk it.
  I would also not want my dog to go on a plane. Partly because again they are not with you.
  If you are not going until September you have plenty of time to get the dog's passport sorted and also the dog will have to be vaccinated against rabies.
  The drive from Calais into Belgium does not take long so could easily be done in a day but Belgium is a lovely country so if you could spend a day or so at different places I am sure you would enjoy it. Some of the coast, in particular, is lovely with huge stretches of sand.
  If I remember rightly I got a list of vets at the Eurotunnel offices in France. I think it may say which ones speak English (if your French is not good enough). In my experience (I lived in France for several years) a lot of vets in France speak English.
  As the previous poster says, France and Belgium are far more dog friendly that this country. I never once found a hotel that would not take dogs and they are allowed in almost all restaurants, cafes, bars etc and some shops and shopping centres
• I 'share' a dog with my father, who lives in the Netherlands. I am abroad for work for long periods and he takes him then. We both like the company as my wife left me and my mother passed away, so it's an arrangement that works for us, however strange it might seem. Mcgruff is happy enough about it ^^
  It's all quite straightforward. Just need to get a rabies shot and pet passport for the dog(s) at your vet's (think it cost me around 70 pounds). When traveling back to the UK, you have to have a vet worm the dog(s) no more than 5 days before entering the UK and note it in the pet passport. You'll find vets in the Flemish part of Belgium will speak English, the French part is a bit more dubious (I grew up in Belgium).
  I travel by car via Eurotunnel, as I like having Mcgruff where I can see him. Don't want to leave him in the car by himself for 2 hours on a ferry and who knows what happens to the pets when flying...
  The Eurotunnel terminals are quite pet friendly, enough places to give them a little walk before boarding the train...
• information here
  https://www.gov.uk/take-pet-abroad/overview
• Anyone know how much the tape worm pill to get back in the UK costs?
  Just booked my dog in for a medical check to get a pet passport (Ј62.21) and a rabies shot (Ј52.76)
• thanks everyone.
  Took gran and doggy to the vets on Friday. Calin and our dog have now been booked in for the rabies jags (vet had to order them up) and Calin will get a medical too. Our dogs medical for being a medical detection dog automatically passports her through this part of the process.
  We've used vets for pets as there was one nearby and the whole thing is costing gran Ј100 - that's consultation, rabies jag, the rabies blood test a month later, the medical and the actual signing off of the passport. We are being charged for the rabies jag and the passport but they have given us a preferential rate due to ours being an assistance dog (they also gave us a discount on their programme for boosters so we paid a lower than the advertised amount and we just need to take her in every year now with nothing to pay).