Originally Posted by jayeff

Yes and no. Some country's issue international licenses which translate the original (I believe the US does). Others merely state that you have a valid license in your country of origin.

I'm not sure about the need to carry the original too (although I guess it couldn't hurt), since the point of an IDL is that they are accepted in many more countries than accept original licenses. Certainly I have never needed to show both.

The only problem I have ever run into (and it happened the only time I was ever asked for a license by the police) was that the guys on the spot simply didn't know what was legal and what wasn't. Fortunately they couldn't be bothered to try to find out, so they just let me go. Anyway the best procedure is to find out what the countries you are visiting accept and there are plenty of sites around with the details.

http://travel.state.gov/travel/tips/...fety_1179.html