The holidays are wonderful times for family and friends. Unfortunately they are often the busiest travel times of the year. Trying to control your ability to get from point A to point B may sound easy, but it’s not. Besides traffic and delays, managing your pets complicates things and adds stress. This is particularly true when you would like to kennel your dog(s), and there’s no availability.
For example, for Thanksgiving this year we had no family coming to town or “orphans” who would come over to be with us. We got an invite from a relative on the Cape (Cod), but had nobody to take care of our dogs. Our favorite kennel was full, and all those kids who used to be around the neighborhood years ago and available to let out and feed them have, alas, grown up and left.
Driving down to the Cape with the RV would have been a no-brainer other than where we could park, on the street or in somebody’s driveway. But our RV was at the mechanic’s for some repairs.
As a last resort we took a look at hotels on the Cape within our traveling path that were dog friendly. Several were listed but when I called, they were either full or wrongly identified as dog-friendly. That’s not uncommon. But there was an exception. The Best Western in Hyannis said they were pet friendly and only required an additional charge of $30 (we have two dogs and that was it). That worked. However, we were still worried about the potential holiday traffic.
On the Road Easiest Day
Driving to the Cape on Thanksgiving morning was only a 2 1/2 hour ride. Not too bad, even with a couple of the usual highway accidents. The one draw back was the hotel room would not be ready until 3PM. So, the dogs got to stay in the car with frequent walks with all of the friends and relatives at the party. Not bad!
After dinner, we drove to the hotel which was clean and totally receptive to the dogs. We really appreciated that. After a good night’s rest for all, the next morning we took advantage of the hotel’s full breakfast. Good and easy way to start the day for returning home. One of the best we have had when staying at hotels. The drive back to NH was uneventful with the dogs snoozing all the way home in the backseat.
Just another example of dogs and their owners loven’ traveling together!