Long journey arvice

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Evening all

taking my 7 year old dog on a long car journey next week for the first time and would really appreciate any advice.

total travelling time with be about 5 hours but planning to stop maybe 3/4 times and give him a wee walk. He’s ok with short journeys in the car (longest has been 15 mins I think) but worried this might be too much or he might be unwell

🐶

When we took our new rescue dog on holiday it was an unknown. Journey was about 4 hours. He was absolutely fine, he had a walk before we left, then we put his bed on the seat (he has a hammock on the back seat) clipped him into his travel harness and off we went. He slept most of the time, we stopped after about one and a half hours so he could stretch his legs, have a wee, then had another stop before arriving at our destination. Took water, bowl treats, towels and wipes (in case he was sick) etc. Maybe don’t put him in the car straight after feeding if you think he might be car sick. However I am sure it will be fine. We planned our journey with suitable stops. Have a great time.

I’m not sure what advice people can give you that isn’t common sense really. I’m travelling 8 hours next week with 2 big dogs, one young and one old. I’m preparing by skipping their main meal the day before (just giving them a snack) and then not feeding them until we get to the destination the next afternoon. It might sound cruel, but they’ll be in the back of the car with a load of clothes and bedding (we’re going hiking/camping), so I’d rather them go a bit hungry for half a day than risk having our entire supplies covered in dog vomit if one of them gets car sick. They’ll be well exercised before so they’re tired and will hopefully sleep most of the way, and we’ll be having lots of stops for them to stretch their legs, and have a wee and a drink.

Long walk before you got and we stop every few hours for a leg stretch and some water
keep the car cool and make sure the dog has somewhere comfy to rest

I would only stop once on a journey that length. You are just prolonging the trip otherwise.

Not sure if dogs are the same as people but most people I know who get car sick feel better when they don’t have an empty stomach.

My dog is 4 years old and it’s only recent that he has been better in the car, he used to be sick on any car journey over 30 minutes and he doesn’t sleep very long. We give him a good walk/run before we go. We have stopped after a couple of hours for him to have a drink and a wee, but we’ve also been stuck in traffic on a 5 hour journey and he did ok. Sometimes it’s better just going for it, as stopping can put on 30 minutes for the journey. We have a plastic sheet that goes under some towels in case he’s sick.

We tend to just go for it. Last journey was 3.5hours and we did it in one (was 9pm though). During a daytime trip I'd do 3 hours but probably one stop if 4hrs and ddog was needing a wee.

I am a 'just get there asap' type of person though! My ExH was a 'let's stop' type of person. Hopefully DDog is now trained to be like me 😄

We regularly do a 4 hour trip. Always take him for a walk before leaving. Then would stop once for a leg stretch, wee and drink. We always give him his breakfast but he doesn't get car sick.

We stop every two hours, so we can stretch our legs (and have a drink and a pee) too. My young one went straight from twenty minutes to the two hours with no problems.

When we’ve done four/five hour journeys we do stop once as everyone else needs to anyway and we feed the dogs small dry treats (their kibble) ever so often a long the way.

Thank you all for the replies.

We are about to do a 2.5 hour drive with our 5 month old puppy who cries every time we go in the car. I'm hoping she falls asleep - she naps all morning so the plan is to leave about 9am when she would be sleeping anyway, after a walk and feed her when we get there.