Relocating:Fly or Drive?

[Dface]

Heyyy!
I’ve been a bit MIA for the past while from here, life got very hectic all of a sudden! 
Ive recently been offered a job, which requires me to move country. Obviously Peep and Yumi will be coming with me, but I wanted to get other peoples inputs here.

Some background: My rabbits are fairly used to traveling (when I was in college we would do a medium length trip about once every six weeks) the trip was anywhere from 3-5 hours depending (and often involved driving, trains and walking) so it was a fairly stressful trip for all involved  

Peep isn’t so bad, but Yumi hates traveling.  Peep is a huge comfort to her, but she refuses to eat or even pee while traveling. However once we stop she is perfectly fine, and normally calms down very quickly when let out of the travel carrier. (I have actually bought a new carrier in the hopes that she is calmer in it, I think she might hate the other one by association) 

My dilemma is deciding the trip
 I can drive and take a ferry which will take about 7-8 hours. This means I will likely find a place that we can safely stop to let them relax for a bit. My hope is that I can get them used to the car boot, and when we stop I can set it up with a litter tray and food and they can relax, or we can check into a pet friendly hotel. For me I lean towards this one, as I can continuously monitor her levels of stress, or even start getting her used to the car boot and desensitizing the pair of them to the car engine when its not moving etc.

The alternative is to fly. Animals are not allowed in cabin and need to go in cargo so that means we will need to be in the airport about 2 hours early, and I do have fears that something could go wrong (I’m a control freak, so I worry about wrong flights, pilots forgetting to turn on the heating, rabbits going into shock, or even people mishandling their box and injuring them when they are being loaded/unloaded)

So one trip is car and ferry~7-8 hours journey
The other would be car-airport-flight-airport-car ~5 hours (flight is only 40mins-an hour)

However I cant tell if I want to drive just so I can have more control over the situation, or if it is in the best interest of the buns?

(as an aside I will likely be doing a drive trip over regardless of if I chose to fly the buns as my boyfriend and I own a lot of junk that is hard to transport by flight ’cause its awkward and clunky)

[Rabbitpossm]

I would say driving is in the best interest, especially since the drive isn’t that much longer. Cargo holds on planes aren’t that great for all pets, and especially stressful for buns. You do have more control if you are driving in ways that are ultimately best for the bun. If anything does go wrong you are there to fix it. I recently moved cross country, took about 5 or 6 days. It was a bit of the struggle but I’m much happier I did that over flying since I was able to monitor and help him.

[LBJ10]

Unless you have no other choice but to fly, I would think driving would be better. Bad things happen to animals in cargo and flying would be very stressful regardless. It would be loud, there would be strange smells, possibly other animals, etc. Plus the change in air pressure when flying isn’t pleasant, even for people. I can’t imagine that that would be less stressful than driving in a car.

[jerseygirl]

A third vote here for driving. I think it would give you peace of mind also to be able to see them both during the journey. And you can do regular stops to let them have time out of the car. I don’t see that added hours they’d need travel via car (vs less flying) as being detrimental to them.

 Are you looking to set them up in a crate or something in the car boot?  Or the carrier would be there?  I used to think it would be nicer for them to allow as much room as possible in a crate/carrier but Ive come to change my mind on that!  A more confined space where they are less likely to be moved around from motion of the vehicle is likely safer and more comforting, IMO.  When you think about it, rabbits will dart of into a small (often dark) area and snuggle together when they are feeling unsafe. It was a Howcast video by HRS that got me rethinking on carriers for travel. Having said that, I know of a little netherland that had a very roomy crate for a 7-8 hour trip and his owner said he did fine. I guess it depend on the individual rabbits. 

Congratulations on the new job!!!

[Dface]

Hey guys thanks so much for the replies! I feel way better in my choice now ?

They will be in carriers while the car is in motion is the plan atm, just incase of any form of accident, and then when the car is stopped, carrier will be open and they’ll have a small set up in the boot of the car. (seats go down to create a nice little area)
The idea is with the weather it might not be feesible to let them out of the car when we stop so i want them comfortable in the boot.
We are planning on desensitising them for a little while (setting up the boot letting them explore it for a few hours, then moving on to letting them in while the engine is on, just so normal car and car noises become easier on them.

We do have a dog crate but its too big imo, and we have two small carriers (which are ideal for forced snuggling) but my plan is to use the third intermediate one, so they will be very close, but peep doesn’t have to have yumi sitting on him the whole journey if he doesn’t want – the other ones are a safe and comfortable fit for 2 normal bunnies, but Yumi tends to just sit on peep and we think the new carrier will help discourage that (fingers crossed).

[jerseygirl]

That sounds like a good plan!

I just thought of another reason why letting them out on ground may not be wise… the viral risks!
So the car boot would be very useful as their space to stretch their floofy legs.

[Q8bunny]

Flying turned out to be a lot more stressful for me than for Chewie, so… having done the plains-trains-and-automobiles trip for 24+ hours with him, I trust pets in cargo now a hellalot more than I used to.

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