Travelling with pet dog - belgium to Ireland

home1

Hi there, I am travelling with a pet dog from Belgium to Ireland in December with aerlingus. I am a little confused with the aerlingus website - they seem to suggest using an external courier company to bring the pet over, that company has quoted me 700 euros for bringing the dog to Ireland.
I'm wondering if anyone has travelled from Europe to Ireland with aerlingus and with a pet and is this how you did it. I expected that maybe the dog would simply go in the hold of the aircraft on the same flight as me.
As it is 700 euro it would be cheaper to leave the dog in Belgium with a dog sitter for the 2 weeks.
Thanks in advance for your help.
-Pat

alltacht

Hi there,
While I haven't actually made the journey I've heavily researched it as we were wanting to bring our dog to Spain next year.
First of all she will need to have had her rabies shot 6 months previous to your travel dates, as well as her passport etc.
We got quotes a lot higher than 700 for the external courier service. It was about 1000 each way!
So it works out prohibitively expensive for most people I'm afraid. We are going to drive instead as she always travels with us.
Is driving an option for you? Otherwise a good petsitter would be the least stressful for you both!
All the best

Vancity

We are bringing our dog from Canada to Ireland in December as we are relocating home permanently. I don't advise doing it unless it's a permanent relocation as there is so much work involved and it can potentially be traumatic for the dog.

For some reason (it seems to stem from Ireland being a rabies free island) dogs must travel into Ireland as manifest cargo rather than in the cabin or the hold of an airplane. So essentially you are getting a quote for an overnight "package" to be delivered to Ireland. After a lot of research and stress we decided to fly to Paris with our dog in the cabin of the plane with us (she is small enough) and travel overland to London (Eurotunnel) where we'll stay with relatives for a couple of days and then on to Ireland via train and ferry from Holyhead to Dublin. It's a crazy journey but worth it to avoid having her travel as cargo because I would just never forgive myself if something went wrong.

Just on the shots requirement - we have gotten everything approved at this point and the rabies shot is only required 21 days or more prior to travel and must be administered after microchip implantation. So perhaps Spain requires a 6 month rabies requirement but I don't think so - from what we were told by the Canadian and UK authorities and online research, the requirements to come into the EU are uniform other than both Ireland and UK requiring an additional tapeworm treatment.

I can't post the link as a new user but if you google "bringing pets into the EU or UK or Ireland" you will find the regulations.

home1

Ah okay - good to hear the same thing from other people. I think it makes sense to just leave the dog here in Belgium - 2 weeks with a dog sitter should be okay for the dog - financially of course it makes much more sense.