starting road trip training

so we started road trip training for the looooooooooooooong drive to portland oregon fromn the deep south. we drove ten miles today with minimal meowing. and I bought a barrier for the back of the wagon so I can set up a little room with things velcros to the carpet sothey dont slide... a litterbox, a water tray and bowl and her carrier which she likes to snuggle in and of course one of her favorite toys a snuggle tube. Tomorrow we are going to drive 30 miles and see how she does in the larger space and then this weekend we are taking her to callaway gardens.... on the alabama georgia border to see a whole day trip is handled. I am also harness training her so she cant bolt away when i open the trunk.

my biggest worry now is carsickness. what are some tips other than not feeding her less than two hours bbefore we hit the road? I dont want to ranquilizer her for 5 days, but I am ok with rescue remedy. So naturalistic tips are welcome.

Originally Posted by Abigail

so we started road trip training for the looooooooooooooong drive to portland oregon fromn the deep south. we drove ten miles today with minimal meowing. and I bought a barrier for the back of the wagon so I can set up a little room with things velcros to the carpet sothey dont slide... a litterbox, a water tray and bowl and her carrier which she likes to snuggle in and of course one of her favorite toys a snuggle tube. Tomorrow we are going to drive 30 miles and see how she does in the larger space and then this weekend we are taking her to callaway gardens.... on the alabama georgia border to see a whole day trip is handled. I am also harness training her so she cant bolt away when i open the trunk.

my biggest worry now is carsickness. what are some tips other than not feeding her less than two hours bbefore we hit the road? I dont want to ranquilizer her for 5 days, but I am ok with rescue remedy. So naturalistic tips are welcome.

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Have fun at Callaway! That is about 15 minutes from my house! Good luck with the kitty travel!!!

I will be interested to see how you get on as Ihave to move my five kits from Bosnia to France in June, and I am trying to decide whether it is best to do it 2 long 12 hour days or three shorter ones. Also I am not sure whether to put them all in a cage in the back of my jeep or in separate cat carriers. I am starting them with some small trips too. So good luck.

I don't feed my three for the morning before travel and give them a herbal travel tablet 30 minutes before departure. (the tablets are called Travel Ease)

I travel with my three in their carriers, but if I were to do a longer trip (and I had a more plausible vehicle for this), I think I would let them be free but barriered from me.

Another tip for preventing travel sickness is to drive slow and steady! Don't overtake unless completely necessary and take it gently on the pulling out. The side to side motion tends to make car sick kitties a little poorly!

Good luck to you and to Jenny, too!

If you don't feed them the morning of the travel ( and I quite see why that would be a good idea) then how do you feed them if a journey is more than one day? Should I feed them only at night when we arrive in a hotel? Don't they meow for food all through the journey?

I think feeding them at night would be a good idea! They will meow a bit - for food or general reasons - but after a short time, they will settle and probably sleep.

My three have done fine without food for their journeys and Tibby will just sleep through the majority of the trip. Molly and Willow will meow if they hear my voice and the other meowing.

You can also provide water for them if you're taking them in their carriers. I have been recommended the rabbit water bottles clipped onto the gate so they can drink without spilling the water.

Our cats do fine on road trips - we put down dry food and a dish of water and they pretty much eat if they feel like it and haven't been sick, thank goodness.

Ditto...except Seamus doesn't eat while in the car, but he will stick his head into my water glass occasionally. And he'll use the litter box when we stop for gas or meals.

We would feed him at night when we stopped in hotels and we always stretched out our trip a little longer to make it easier on him. I think the most we drove was 8-10 hours

I drove from northern Colorado to southern California a few months ago, and the trip ended up being about 23 hours long. I had both kittens with me and a passenger in my compact car that was stuffed as much as possible.

I had to let them roam around in the car, but they weren't generally obnoxious. I would have loved to have a section of the car caged off for them, but I was moving, so I just didn't have the space. I had a cage for each kitten, and their litter box on the top of the stuff in the back seat.

I had them in the carriers until both people were settled, and then I let them out. They moved around for a bit, and if I'd been alone, it would probably have been bad. My passenger was able to comfort them and keep them out of the windshield, though. I had their harnesses on them so they were easy to grab. That was important when Bella decided to nap under the clutch in the middle of Utah. Rowan got his harness off, and chucked it into the front seat just to show that he didn't need it, and he was angry that I put it on him, but we were only about an hour away from our new house, so I didn't bother to pull over and put it back on. I just stuck them both back into carriers for the walk inside.

Neither of them likes their own carrier much, but Bella doesn't mind being in Rowan's, and he doesn't mind being in hers. Don't ask how it works, but it just does. Rowan and Bella napped for a while in his carrier, but he spent most of the trip in the litter box. He hasn't ever expressed a desire to be outside ever again, so we let him stay in there during stops when we got out. We stuck Bella in a carrier, though. I think that having their favorite blanket out for them to sleep on really helped, as did their towels on the bottom of the carriers. Bella was much less upset when we could cover her (she's a real cave kitty).

Bella cried a lot about the altitude changes. At least, I assume it was the altitude changes. She mainly cried when my ears were hurting too, because I had a nasty head cold.

I didn't really 'train' them with little trips. Bella just flat out hates the car. Rowan is just fine in the car, as long as he's not locked in a carrier. I don't really think that I could ever convince Bella that being in a car is fun. She doesn't like the engine noise.

I had water and food avalible for them the whole trip. Neither of them pukes unless they're fed really poor-quality food, so I didn't even think about car sickness. Rowan ate and drank (and used the litterbox), but Bella didn't eat, and I don't know if she drank anything.