Traveling With Cats in RV or Car

Cat Lovers unite! Travelers have been taking their dogs along in their travels since the beginning of time. Now cat owners are joining other pet lovers who travel with their pets. Cats travel by car, train and airplane! We've seen cats in carriers on the back of bicycles and in kitty strollers. There are even many cats who live happily with their owners in their RVs.

Our experience with traveling cats has been while traveling in a motor home. When we started full-time RVing, we had two seven-year old cats, Gemini and Shadow. They readily adapted to living in the RV although it took a little time for them to get used to traveling in a moving vehicle.

Whether you travel with your cat in a car or an RV, there are things you can do to make travel with your cat easier and safer.

• Get Kitty a check-up. Before you travel with Kitty, be sure that she has a checkup and that her vaccinations are up-to-date. You will need to carry a copy of her rabies certificate and it’s a good idea to carry a health certificate signed by your vet. Make a folder of all veterinary records to carry with you in case you need to take your cat to a vet while traveling. If you plan to travel into Canada or Mexico, be sure to check ahead of time to see what you’ll need to do. You will most certainly need a recent health certificate signed by your veterinarian.
• Familiarize Kitty with the RV. If you travel in an RV with your cat, let Kitty get used to the RV ahead of time. Bring the cat in with you and let her wander around the inside of the RV, getting acquainted with all of its nooks and crannies. Give her a little treat. One thing that helped our cats adjust was to place a soft throw on the dash for them. It helps protect the vinyl covering on the dash and the cats liked to sit on it and look out the window at the birds and activity outdoors.
• Get Kitty used to the crate. If your cat will be traveling in a cat carrier, get her used to it by leaving it open with a treat inside. Your cat will probably investigate and be more comfortable with it if she can go in and out with the door propped open. It would also be a good idea to take her for short car rides in it that don’t end up at the vets. She needs to know that every car ride does not take her to the vet’s office.
• Familiarize Kitty with harness and leash. It’s a good idea to let your cat get used to a leash and harness because you will want to take her outdoors now and then for exercise.
  
  Some cats, especially if they are young, will adapt to a harness easily and will enjoy walking outdoors. Others may resist and need some coaxing.
  
  Our cats have always hated the harness, and at first refused to move at all when it was on them, but eventually did condescend to walking around while in it. One way to get them used to the harness is to put it on while they are indoors, and let them get used to walking around without the leash. With our cats, it seemed to be the weight of the leash that annoyed them. We’ve found that a collar and leash just don’t work as a frightened cat can almost always slip out of a collar. You certainly don’t want to lose Kitty in a rest area or campground, so its better to be safe.
• Collar Tags. Get tags with your name and cell phone number on them in case your cat gets lost.
• Chip implant. To be extra safe, you can get an identification chip implanted in your cat.

• Cat carrier
• Cat first aid kit and grooming tools
• Cat toys
• Cat bed
• Scratching pad or post
• Food and water from home
• Collar, harness and leash
• Litter box

• Hotel Reservations. If you are planning to stay in a hotel, check ahead of time to find out their pet policies. Many hotels allow pets, but some will charge extra fees.
• Crate the cat. When traveling by car, you will probably want to keep your cat safely in her crate while moving.  Line the floor of the crate with disposable diapers with the plastic side down just in case your cat gets car sick.  It makes a soft bed, but is easy to clean up.
  
• Give Kitty a rest stop. When you stop for rest stops, take Kitty out of the crate and give her a chance to use the litter box if she wants to. Cats can go without using the litter box for hours, so she may not use it. Don’t worry.
• Keep windows and doors closed so that she can’t escape. We usually put the harness and leash on our cats when we stop on a car trip as it’s easier to grab a trailing leash than the cat who might scoot under the car.
• Give her some attention when you stop, but don’t offer food or drink until you are settled in your hotel. Most cats travel better without food in their stomachs.
• When you reach your destination, give kitty a chance to explore her surroundings, but make sure she knows where you’ve placed the litter box,  food and water. Put her scratching pad close by and bring in a toy or two so that she can get some play and exercise time.
• Never leave your cat locked in the car during warm weather. Even when it's only mildly warm out, the sun shining in the windows can make the inside of the vehicle excessively hot and very dangerous for your cat.
  

• Litter Box. Because of the space constraints in an RV, you may have to get creative when placing the litter box. Much will depend on the interior layout of your rig. Some people can place it in the bathroom, others put it in the shower. Either way, you will have to leave doors open all the time and will have to deal with tracked litter. This would not be our choice. Full time RVers have gotten creative with their solutions to this problem. Other cat owners use litter boxes with tops on them and place them under the dinette. In our case, we cut a hole the size of a small cat door from the stairway into the compartment below and placed the litter box in the compartment. This can be accessed from outdoors to be cleaned. Though cleaning is a little awkward, keeping the litter box in the compartment keeps tracked litter to a minimum. Wherever you place it, the litter box will need to be cleaned once or twice a day. We find that it's most convenient to carry a large plastic coffee can to place the waste in until it can be tossed in the trash. Never empty cat litter outdoors on the ground -- it's littering!
  
• Safety. Some pet owners like to crate their cats while traveling. Others will confine them to a bedroom or bathroom. We have always let our cats roam free in the RV, but they do not move around when we are moving. As soon as we start the motor, one cat would find a spot under the dining table and the other sat in the bedroom under the overhanging bedspread. They usually didn’t leave these positions until we stopped, although if the road was exceptionally rough, Gemini likes to sit in my lap. I guess there’s more cushioning there!
• Scratching post. If you value your furniture and rugs, provide a scratching pad or post for your cats. Ours like the Turbo Scratcher which has a cardboard scratching pad inset into a round frame.  It's surrounded by a grove with a ball in it that provides a lot of fun without losing the ball.   They learned to like this as kittens, and use it several times a day, both to play and to scratch. Gemini always uses the scratching pad after he comes out of the litter box. It’s somewhat like washing your hands after using the bathroom, I think.
  
• Food and water. Cats digestive systems can become upset by many changes in water and food. Try to buy cat food that is commonly found so that you won’t have to change brands frequently. Since we usually buy bottled drinking water by the gallon for ourselves, we also give our cats bottled water rather than water from each different water source.
• Deal with cat hair. In a confined space like an RV, your cat’s shedding could become a nuisance much quicker than it would in a house. You can cut down on some of the shedding by more frequent grooming. As a cat owner, you know that your cat will choose his own favorite spot. When we saw that the cats liked to sit on the front window, we covered the dash with a soft throw. Another favorite spot was the corner of the couch where we placed a folded towel reserved for the cat. These can be shaken out every day and help keep the cat hair down in other areas.
• Keeping the cats safely indoors. This is tricky if your cat is used to going outdoors. We had to put a lock on our screen door because the cat learned how to open it and get out. Some RVers have special cages which their cats use outdoors. Gemini likes to go out with us and sit in a chair nearby, so we always put on his harness and leash and bring him out with us. I always tie his leash to the chair just to be safe.

• Letting your cat loose outdoors. Best advice is: Don’t do it! Campgrounds don’t allow pets to roam around off leash. If you are out boondocking, it might be tempting to let your cat go exploring, but it is not a good idea.
  
  Cats are natural predators and will hunt birds which might be protected species or that other campers might be attracting. There are also poisonous snakes, spiders and lizards that could make it dangerous for your cat. Gemini loves to stalk small lizards which are usually too fast for him, but once when he did catch a blue tailed skink and ate it, it made him sick. Coyotes consider cats a delicacy.
  
  

We traveled with two cats for four years while full time RVing, and we still travel with one cat, Gemini, who is now thirteen years old. He is quite happy to travel, and when we are parked at our home base, will often sit on the steps of the RV and ask to be let in. He has developed a routine when we are on the move by sleeping in the same spot, eating when we stop for meals. He also usually only uses the litter box when we are stopped, which is a good thing. When we are stationary, he likes to sit on the dash or on the back of the couch and look out the window, especially if there are birds around or people walking past the RV.

Surprisingly, our cat even earns his keep by catching an occasional mouse or ground squirrel that has entered the RV from some tiny opening. One week he caught a whole family of mice that had moved in under our dashboard. We were so happy he did!

Of course, a cat, like any pet, offers companionship and entertainment. Gemini is an alarm clock and a lap warmer, a comforter and a conversationalist. We are delighted to have him as our traveling companion.

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Copyright ©2010 Stephanie Henkel