Yet another Passport Question

[papaflamingo]

We are doing the Grand Spice Cruise in March from Auckland to (now) Cape Town, South Africa.  We each have around 12 blank passport pages.  However now that Africa is in the mix, along with Vietnam, Indonesia, India, UAE, Oman Cambodia, Thailand, is anyone familiar with how many of these countries stamp the passport?  After leaving the ship in South Africa we will be going to Zimbabwe and have been told we need 2 consecutive pages for each country visited.  No problem unless the other 3 African countries also need 2 consecutive pages.  

So....any info at all helps... Thanks.

[mrlevin]

Papa, we are on same cruise as you in addition we are continuing on up the west coast of Africa.  Don't forget NZ and Australia now have "visas."  I would not chance it with only 12 pages in passport as you need apparently six consecutive when going to South Africa; too many chances for one of the early countries to use one of those pages like happened to a number of people on 23 world cruise (maybe one of them could pipe in).  I just checked and there are 30 consecutive blank pages in my passport and 34 in my wife's passport; I think we should be ok.

[RachelG]

I wouldn’t chance it either.  We just got our new passports and I ordered the big “book” just for that reason.

[PaulMCO]

Likely you will need more. 

 

Immigration officers are different.  Some will do an entry and exist on one page and another will put the entry on one page and exist on another page nowhere near the first.  Some will even stamp over another countries entry stamp.

 

Last visit to South Africa everything was on one page but the rule says 2 pages.

 

Vietnam 2 pages (full page for Visa plus stamps)

Cambodia 2 pages (full page for Visa plus stamps)

India 2 page (full page for Visa plus stamps)

Oman and UAE will stamp in/out.  I have 3 trips to the UAE on one page.

Auckland/Australia -- visas are now electronic and only an in/out stamps

Thailand and Indonesia only In/Out stamps

 

Plus 4 pages for SA and Zimbabwe (last time they only stamped in/out on one page in SA) 

 

Zimbabwe gave us a visa stamp.   Make sure you have cash $ 75pp for the visa.

 

@mrlevin good advise.  Don't count on the immigration officers being logical as to where they stamp.  You have no control over this as you may normally do as most of the stamping will be done in the Purser's conference room with the immigration officer onboard when they clear the ship.

[papaflamingo]

Thank you all for the info. Looks like we'll be ordering a new passport. 😏

[mrlevin]

21 minutes ago, papaflamingo said:

Thank you all for the info. Looks like we'll be ordering a new passport. 😏

Papa, let me know when you start working the visas.  I know Regent says "comprehensive visa package" but I still think most of the legwork will have to be done by us.

[Mahogany]

My understanding is that when ETIAS goes into effect mid-2025, no passports will be stamped upon entry into the Schengen countries. Of course, you're leaving in March so doesn't apply. Just my 2 cents.

When the purser retains our passports onboard, are they stamped at each country we enter, even if we are not doing face-to-face?

[PaulMCO]

39 minutes ago, Mahogany said:

My understanding is that when ETIAS goes into effect mid-2025, no passports will be stamped upon entry into the Schengen countries. Of course, you're leaving in March so doesn't apply. Just my 2 cents.

When the purser retains our passports onboard, are they stamped at each country we enter, even if we are not doing face-to-face?

Depends on the country.  But generally yes.  I have an array of stamps from our west African trip including Ghana, Benin, Congo, Togo, Namibia, Angola, Sao Tome ....  Caribbean is an exception (no stamps)

[papaflamingo]

14 hours ago, mrlevin said:

Papa, let me know when you start working the visas.  I know Regent says "comprehensive visa package" but I still think most of the legwork will have to be done by us.

Will do.  But there is a page that you can access to see what visas are required for any specific cruise, and they do show on the booking confirmation the visas they'll provide for us. But I am going to double check each country anyway to be sure. 

https://visacentral.com/additional-client-info

[mrlevin]

Indonesia was dropped off of booking confirmation; I think that is my primary concern with all the horror stories recently.  I guess the days are past when we had to physically provide our passports to embassies and/or consulates.

Edited September 3 by mrlevin

[PaulMCO]

This the Regent link to VISACentral...

 

https://visacentral.com/tourkits?bookmark=1&login=rssc