Transportation with a camp stove/burner

Please, please, please, don't use a burner that makes a flame indoors. Carbon Monoxide (CO) will kill you. Just last week in the paper I read was an article where 3 people cooking a meal outside went inside when the rain started and they all died from the CO. I saw a similar one a few months ago, too. How can people even suggest cooking with fire indoors, even without cooking onions, putting the building and other guests as well as staff in peril, from fire if not the CO. My memory is not perfect but I'm pretty sure I remember an entire hotel/hostel burning down a few years ago in Paris in similar circumstances. Please only use a camp stove when camping... thanks

A couple things concern me about your trip. The food and the burner. Firstly the burner and fuel. There's no way, checked or non-checked you can take any sort of fire propellant on the plane. If the burner itself is just a piece of metal, that is cleaned of any flammable residue, you should be able to check it in, doubtful you can carry on with you. I think you'll be seriously flagged and questioned bringing a metal heating device onto the plane in your carry on. This is just my experience with various customs, not supported by actual literature, so you should really check into customs regulations for the countries you'll be flying in/out of. For the food, there's also strict regulations on what you can and cannot bring in and out. People fly with sandwiches, etc. in and out of Europe all the time, that wouldn't be a problem. If you're bringing a large enough quantity of food product to last you exclusively a few weeks or longer, I think it would flag a search and possibly make you throw out certain products not allowed through customs. Each country has their own issue with food products and it can vary even by who is doing the actual search. We had to throw out some Dole dried fruit snacks leaving Germany a few months ago...don't really understand why. We also had to throw out Dole fruit cups because the liquid measurement wasn't on the individual cup so they could see how much liquid was in there. So, check carefully the customs regulations for the country you are flying in/out of. Lastly, if you do get the stove/burner thing through to Europe, you can buy propellant and other camping equipment at a sports store like Decathlon that is around most of eastern and western Europe.

I agree with Kathy that you may have trouble with different food items. Also, all that dehydrated food will strike both TSA and arrival customs as weird, and you will receive extra scrutiny. The easiest thing would be to buy a small camp stove when you arrive. Are you planning on camping? If you're doing this to save money, you should factor in the original cost of the food, and the extra baggage fees you'll incur when you check that food. It may be cheaper to shop at local groceries. If you're staying in hostels, most will have cooking facilities. Certainly no hotel or hostel wants you to use a camp stove in the room.

Siobian, here is the promised info from my friend who backpacked through Europe with a camp stove. First of all, they took the stove with them from the states, but had purchased it in Europe during a prior trip many years ago. They purchased the fuel cartridges in Europe and mostly could not take them along from country to country. They packed the stove on top of their pack, so they could remove it easily and show that it had no cartridges in it. She had researched her prospective locations and found camping goods stores online if possible. Also, she told me that she cooked everywhere, even in rooms in cheap places to stay but was careful not to cook something like onions, etc. and opened windows if possible.
She said she cooked in parks, near railway stations, even on the occasional curb. They piled their backpacks around the stove and cooked quick meals or heated up take-out. She immediately said that dehydrated food would get thrown out, you'd have to purchase groceries over there. On the trains, who's to know you have a camp stove? Just put it in a little bag of some kind. Remember, they may make you throw out the cartridges, especially in Western Europe, when you cross borders. She also said hostels were the best, since all had cooking facilities and many had utensils and pots etc. Now you have to walk the Appalachian Trail to use up all that dehydrated food! Best of luck and have fun!

Nigel has made an excellent point. I cannot imagine using a camp stove inside; you endanger yourselves and others as well. I know that Siobian said they will be camping, so that is OK, and this is not directed to her. But there was also a suggestion by someone else that the stove could be used in one's room at hostels, etc. Please do not even consider that.

I'm trying to imagine how anyone would know they were crossing borders in Europe with a camp stove or fuel. I'm not suggesting anyone break any rules, I'm just baffled. You can hardly tell you ARE crossing a border, and I haven't seen any kind of customs check on either the roads or trains in years. We just got back from Europe, and I saw people cooking their own food outdoors at a rest stop on the Luxembourg/German border. They MUST have carried their stove across a border but no one seemed to care.
Am I missing something?

Is Siobian still in the building? There's plenty advice here but no feedback from the Original Poster.... are we talking in the wilderness? BTW - if they had been crossing by train between Switzerland and Italy when I did a couple of months ago they would certainly know they were crossing a border! The train stopped about 20 minutes when about 20 or 30 men and women got on (with guns) and checked everybody's papers and opened many pieces of luggage in the area around the luggage. They were both Swiss and Italian police and border agents. I saw them find all sorts of interesting and personal things as I was sitting close to the luggage bins.

Nigel, thanks for the posting. How interesting that you encountered such a thorough check on your train. So I stand corrected--I guess it can happen!

I asked Anna, the one who said her friends had trouble crossing borders with their stove/fuel, how long ago they had traveled, since that looked like old information. She said they had traveled last fall - but they "crossed borders" by plane. That explains the difficulty.

Well you can't fly with fuel cannisters, but I'll bet they have figured that out by now.

Yes, Nigel I am still in the building. I am sorry I have not had a chance to reply to all of the helpful comments. Thank you to everyone that has taken interest in this topic. You have been extremely helpful.
I am very bummed about not being able to bring my food. I have a lot of food restrictions and I am nervous about not having back up food. I have never rode on a train before. Do you check your bags or do you carry them on? The only time we will be flying is from London to Ireland and from Ireland to Germany. The rest of it will be by train.

Regarding luggage on trains - you tote what you brung. You have to be able to lift what you have up into the train and back down. There is no checked luggage. It varies how much up and down depending on which country and type of train. Some are nearly level, especially new trams like in Manchester, London, Nice, Rome. Some are 2 or 3 very high narrow steps like up into the old Regionale trains in Italy or old trams anywhere. Sometimes you can put a small piece over your head on a rack, sometimes you can slip a suitcase between the seatbacks, sometimes you leave it by the door either loose or in a bin. There are dozens of types of train and class combinations throughout Europe.

About the Stove:
You can check your stove and or take it as a carry on with the airlines. You can take EMPTY new liquid fuel bottles i.e(MSR type) with out any fuel residue odor. You can not take compressed fuel canisters,as in propane or isobutane/propane canisters like the Jet-boil type.
As to using an open flame indoors. This should not be a problem. Open flame cooking has been going on indoors for centuries. You will not be harming anyone. The small amount of CO is negligible. It is not like you are heating you enclosed space for many hours at a time. Don't listen to the "I read once in the paper" stories.
I have tested the CO levels in a closet with door closed the stove was a NOVA OPTIMUMS multi-fuel stove running on diesel. This was the most offensive fuel I could use. The closet was a 8 by 4 by ft high. I couldn't get a reading. but after 1 hr on low setting it resulted in 4 ppm reading. Again this is negligible. Remember that today's modern stoves have very complete combustion and not a lot left over.
Note levels in modern homes. Average levels in homes without gas stoves vary from 0.5 to 5 parts per million (ppm).Levels near properly adjusted gas stoves are often 5 to 15 ppm which is fine and those near poorly adjusted stoves may be 30 ppm or higher. This may give some concern over the long term.
You should be fine across Europe and traveling and cooking anywhere with the stove of your choice. Personally I like the MSR international series multi-fuel since parts and bottles are available worldwide. If you want less issue with getting your new fuel bottle across the pond, paint it blue label it water. Fill it with water and drink out of it. When you get where you are going convert it to a fuel bottle by filling it with fuel, at the end of the trip toss it. The juice is not worth the squeeze to deodorize it and bring it back. Save the cap.
HazMat Specialist

This question was asked a year and a half ago. My guess is the OP already took her trip.