Not sure it is pretty basic, but common yes, and there are a number of ways to handle it - and plenty of scope for confusion or messing things up. My preference, because it eliminates much of the latter, is to do a File Export as Catalog on one machine, take its output catalogue and either open this little catalogue itself, or do File > Import as Catalogue to bring it into the main catalogue on the other machine. Then, on the way back, it's Export as Catalog again. This Export/Import as Catalog feature was designed for exactly this type of workflow.
Other ways are to save metadata (Ctrl S / Cmd S) and then take the picture file and any xmp sidecar with you. This is easy enough for small numbers of images from one or two folders.
John