ADVENTURES TRAVELLING WITH MY CAT
By Ken Shindler, HILLSIDE Maine Coons
I have often thought that it would be interesting to collect and publish stories told by people who have travelled with their cats. Especially people travelling to and from cat shows. Some of these stories would make your hair stand on end!
Like arriving in Edmonton to find that those nice airline people have sent your show cat to Winnipeg. Like arriving at the «show hotel» and having the hotel management not only deny knowledge of the show but decline to accept your cats.
Or arriving at the show hotel in Dallas late on New Years Eve and finding that because of the Cotton: Bowl being played the next day, a number of guests have not checked out and you are only one of a busload of people and cats looking for a to lay their weary heads.
Or after that same show, finding same that the airline has never heard of you and can’t accommodate more animals on the flight anyway and that you will have to smuggle your (in our case, to Canada).
While our primary area of show activity is with the Canadian Cat Association, Alma and I make periodic forays into «TICA country» to show the flag, see where the breed is going. and do some dealing with other breeders.
On December 31, 1987 we left for Dallas, Texas for a two day show, travelling via Toronto and Chicago.Our travel agent had fouled things up and the airline had no record of us. We were able to get seats for ourselves on the next morning’s flight but they could not accommodate our cats. Desperate measures were called for.
A quick trip to the boutiques, credit card in hand, produced two of those cute shoulder bags with airholes for kitty breath. We would cope. On arrival at the Dallas Airport in the wee hours of Monday morning, we decided to check in and travel.
New Year’s Eve we with other Eve was celebrated with many other cats in the Holiday Inn bus, all day in bus, but eventually everybody was bedded dow here down somewhere. We We had come with one male cat and were were taking delivery of a female kitten from Fran Lloyd (sent from Chattanooga, TN by way of Atlanta, our cats are better travelled than humans), most en Sunday afternoon, during a lull in the show, I called the airline to confirm our reservations.
New Year’s Eve was celebrated with many other overtired people and cats in the Holiday Inn bus …separately so that if one was dis covered at least the other would hopefully get through. Alma took the kitten, and I the adult. I will never forget the look on the security agent’s face when he saw a skeletal cat Saw passing through his x-ray machine. Still pretending we didn’t know each other,
Alma chose a scat at the rear of the aircraft and sat at one end of the waiting room. I sat at the other end with will a pass for a seat at the boarding pass front of the the airplane.
The trip to Chicago was uneventful but on «deplaning» I found that our connecting flight was at the other end of the terminal. Less she lose her way of the tent in the labyrinth that is the O’Hare Terminal, I waited for Alma at the at the foot of the ramp and made sure that she could see me. Then like two spies in a bad movie, we made our way to the connecting flight, I in front, she following ten feet behind.
It was not until we reached Toronto that we could breath easier and acknowledge each other’s exis tence. In Canada, the security people work for the airlines, not the terminal, and we knew that our shoulder bags and we were not legal so we legitimized the process. A detour to the customer process. A detour service counter resulted in the of chase of one of those grand awful Air Canada plastic carriers and the cats were checked through to Ottawa. The fool behind the counter insisted on charging us double (because there were two cats in the carrier) but I later got refund and an apology from Air Canada.
That was one weekend we were glad to see behind us.
The TICA show held annually at the Madison Square Garden in New York is an experience in itself. Not an necessarily an experience you will want to repeat, but an experience nonetheless.
If you like a show with lots of promotions and freebies, this is the show for you. If you like a show with wall-to-wall people, this is the show for you. If you like having your ving your pocket picked on the way to the show ring, or having to hide the water dish lest a spectator squeegee in some antifreeze to poison your cat, or having to make sure someone sits at naving the cage at all times lest your cat be stolen, this is your show.
The rings are set up back-to-back with a sort of tunnel in between. When called, cats are brought up in their carriers to the open end of the tunnel where a security guard allows only exhibitors with cats to pass. You then enter the ring from the rear, put your cat in the cage, retreat back to the tunnel behind the curtain, sit on your carrier and wait until the class. has been judged.
La Guardia is really an old fashioned airport. From the departure spons lounge, you can see bags, etc. being aded into loaded into the plane just below you..
Not seeing our carrier, I asked the passenger agent to phone downstairs to enquire if they were loading our cat. A few minutes later, he came over, asked toutes late to see our tickets and boarding passes and took them away. A moment later he was back.
«I’ve changed your seating,» he said. «You now have seats A and C. You will find your cat in seat B.» Sure enough, when we boarded, there was big Beau in his carrier strapped securely into seat B.
But more to the point, my tale is captain and several of the cabin about the trip home. We arrived at attendants were cat lovers also, and La Guardia Airport on Monday morn- before we took off, all had opened ing, left Beaujolais in his carrier at the their wallets to show us photos of cargo office and went to the departure their own feline friends. lounge. LaGuardia is really an old … when we boarded, there was big Beau in his carrier strapped securely into seat B.
The flight would continue to Ottawa but first put down in Montreal for customs and immigration clearance.
Anyone who has travelled through Dorval Airport from the U.S. knows that long trek through the tunnel to the customs hall, along the length of the terminal and back through another tunnel to the aircraft. But first there was this security man.
«Animals cannot travel in the cabin, monsieur,» I was told. «You must go back and put it in cargo.» This cat, I advised him, has permis sion from the aircraft’s captain to travel in the cabin.
«Non, c’est impossible!» he replied firmly. I I was faced with petty bureaucracy in all its rampant glory. I pointed to his telephone and told him call the gate and and speak to the captain himself. Grudgingly he did so and after a very terse telephone call, we were waved resignedly through, cat and all. As we boarded, the door to the flight deck opened and the captain gave us a thumbs up and grinned broadly. And that is how Beau flew back to
Canada, sitting proudly on a cabin seat, just like people!