Many may appreciate frictionless entry to Schengen visa countries. Sometime in 2025 that will change: What is ETIAS - European Union What you need to apply - European Union Start date uncertain. I include two links because one says apply before you know travel details, and the other says travel details are needed for application. Looks like a muddle to me. Will need to provide "details about your level of education and current occupation" This seems a bit invasive to me. I have not entered all that many countries, but none have seemed so curious. Responses like 'higher than yours" are probably not the way to go.
I would appear that nations DO get to have borders in SOME places. @ 'somewhat invasive.' I haven't been to the EU in over 10 years, and I would be happy to never again be required to go back. SO... MY last impression of the EU is that asking tourists for a quick bio and travel itinerary would probably be among the lesser intrusive things that they do. If they want to require their cits to always carry 'papers' and hang cameras everywhere - that's a 'them' thing. We have a magic parchment that shields us from SOME THINGS here in the 'land of the free'......but (say some) having a border is not one of them. Irony..... GOD's humor at work. I would not mind a reciprocal requirement for INCONUS travel, as long as one remembers that tourism is an income source. EUropeans seem to be used to living in a more 'documented' environment than we are - so this may all work to our advantage. I have a friend who runs a hotel in a Tennessean college town that has a substantial number of overseas leisure travelers. The FIRST thing he does when they ask about 'local things to do' is to set them up with an appointment at a nearby gun range with a discount.
i'm glad i don't have to travel for work anymore, and was never bitten by the 'travel bug'. but friends and family tell me it's not as bad as the media would have you believe.
I do not use 'media' to gauge real life. Travel - SUCKS. Being somewhere else often times, does not. Like many things in life.... You have to do YOU. Me? Growing up in my beloved home state of Indiana, I was filled with wander-lust - thinking that distant horizons were better ones. Now I am MORE than content to stay closer to home. Nine sea service ribbons, two OEF/OIF deployments, leaving foot prints on five continents and 50 states, and settling down three states away from the home sod.......MAY color my thinking. MY mileage. Others will vary.
one of our daughters has wanderlust. she generally does two exotic trips a year. she loved iceland, and also cuba! japan is up next, and she doesn't do vacation spots or tourist traps. hiking is often involved.
Always the best way to do it. She's going to fall in LOVE with Japan! I didn't think much of Cuba - but then, even though a LOT of hiking, boating, and cycling was involved - I probably didn't see the best parts.....
Because I'll be visiting the Southern most tip of Texas, I've thought about going to Mexico: Buying meds at a Mexican discount (but I'm already on generics) Closer to StarShip viewing areas Bob Wilson
I would totally party in cross-border Matamoros. Passport in secondary pocket, three copies of main page in front pocket, and big money and credit cards in your shoes. Like the bad guys don't know to look there It may not be Bob's thing to smoke a Cuban cigar but I totally would. Also, seafood restaurants. Que Mamey.
Hard pass. .....on the cigars. Going into Mexico doesn't scare me much but I take no meds nor do I smoke. Anything. It's like California, and a few other places. I already have the T-shirt.
Tried one on a Canadian trip ... for tobacco, nice. But my late wife had given up smoking and we weren't going to tempt a return of that foul habit. I just wished she hadn't driven her MPH speedometer using the KPH speed signs. There is a reason I know 1.6 km per mile. I would be tempted to go to Quebec for an extended, month or longer, immersion French school/vacation. I used to passibly read French. My Oklahoma accented, high school French provided no end of amusement to the Québécois on a family vacation. As for climate, I prefer froid over chauffer. Canadians have trout like we have perch and no strangers to every other delectable goodness. Of course, 'Les filles du Québec sont très agréables à regarder.' Bob Wilson
In my barefoot and ragged jeans days, I found myself at Southern California's Claremont colleges for a bit. We would head to the Gulf of California in Mexico for long weekends. Once there we'd enjoy cheap tequila, beer and seafood. My Spanish is about as good as my Swedish LOL...my father tried to teach me Swedish... I avoid smoking anything, even that wacky weed stuff. And since an accident several years ago, had to pull the plug on alcohol...I am not on any regular meds, but on the rare chance I need something, alcohol does not play nice with any of them. All I have nowadays is a passport CARD. Gets me into Mexico, Canada in the event Trump reinstates the military draft and I need to take a vacation. Actually, a friend from high school went into the military and she liked it... kris And, yes, btw, I AM of Swedish heritage, but too cold to wear bikinis there
In my early 20's I took a trip with my military roommate to his home in Sacramento California to spend a couple of weeks. We had saved up 30 days leave and drove all over the Southwestern US. At Nogales Arizona we decided to go into Mexico and add this side trip to our journey. Getting into Mexico was no issue. Returning back home waiting to enter back into the US at the Mexican Border we realized that two 20 something young men returning back to the US through the border crossing in the mid 1970's was a very bad idea. The only thing that saved us I believe was our military ID's. I'm not sure I would ever feel comfortable returning back to Mexico and returning through a border checkpoint because of that experience. I did enjoy Mexico and the cities we visited -but it wasn't worth the risk we took when returning.
I traveled back and forth across the Mexico border in California -- always on foot, from the latter part of the 1970s through the late 1980s. Mostly at Calexico or Tijuana. Never had an issue,, except for one day I decided while on US soil, to take a picture of the Calexico crossing -- this was around 1985. Was surrounded by US BP/Customs agents and dragged off to a interview room. They never searched me....what it came down to was hand over the film or else... After a few futile attempts to assert my supposed rights, i gave up the film. The only things I ever carried over the border, other than legal personal items....camera, clothing, etal, was tequila and other legal tourist trinkets.
When I was in San Diego (BRIEFLY - THANK GOD!!!) a couple of times there were squids who would go down to TJ and they treated it like traveling from Idaho to Oregon. HOWEVER (comma!!!) we were always warned in no uncertain terms by the base police and NIS/NCIS locals to maybe go there once just to say you've been there but probably not to make it a habit. I crossed over in Nogales two or three times in the 90's and I have no really good reason to do so again. Mexico is a lovely nation I am sure - but just as is the case here in America there are probably places you would not want to go. TJ and Nogales appear to be two such places. Sample size=1 - nearly 30 years ago.
