RV'ing with your pet

Rice RV has some pet-friendly units. Nobody has ever asked to bring anything other than a dog, so maybe we should call them dog-friendly units. Before deciding to bring your pet, look up animal rules for your destination. Don't count on being able to leave your pet in the RV while you are out for the day. Especially in the summer, an RV gets as hot as a car and could be deadly for a dog. Even if you are plugged in and leave the air conditioner on, a circuit breaker could blow or the park could lose power and you would not know your pet was sweltering in a closed-up RV.

We charge an extra security deposit for renters taking a pet along in case we end up cleaning up animal hair or worse. Just having a dog lie on the sofa of the RV for extended periods of time can leave a smell, and then we have to take the RV out of circulation until we can deodorize it thoroughly. Be sure your pet will not cause damage to our RV (and, thus, expense to yourself) before deciding to bring him or her along. And woe to the renter who does not inform us about his pet traveling with him and returns the RV with a hairy carpet or clawed furniture!

Our Golden Retriever, Maggie, often accompanies us on RV trips. While driving, we leave Maggie's water bowl in the sink and put it on the floor on longer stops. She likes to lie on a cool, uncarpeted floor, but this causes her to slide around a bit on turns. She is most comfortable near our daughter, Melissa, her favorite family member, and this helps keep her anxiety down on long drives. In a larger RV, we bring her bed. Of course, we have to bring plenty of plastic bags and a good leash for walks around the RV park and cleaning up after Maggie.

Maggie had a litter of puppies last year and recently a family that adopted one of the puppies returned her to us because they have to move. Now we have 2 Golden Retrievers, and Roxy is not yet as well-trained as Maggie. I'll let you know later how it works out to try to bring 2 large dogs in an RV...