In Brazil you are given a three-month stay as a tourist when you arrive. If you wish to remain for longer you must visit the Federal Police and apply before your visa expires.
We faced a tricky situation, though. Our visa expired on April 24. We couldn't have gone before Kobra's birth because Jamie was heavily pregnant. And we couldn't go immediately after Kobra was born because Jamie was told by our midwife not to walk for 15 days.
We also didn't want to take our 12-day-old daughter on a long journey by car to Ilheus, about two-and-a-half hours away. But we had no choice. Each applicant MUST appear in person.
To make the trip easier, we travelled the day before from Piracanga to Itacare by jeep. It's an extremely bumpy road and the journey was made more difficult by heavy rain flooding the roads.
Nonetheless, we made it and stayed the night in Itacare. Then early the next morning, helped by our friend Sam, who is staying in Piracanga near to us and speaks Portuguese, we made the hour-or-so drive to Ilheus to visit the police.
But it wasn't as straightforward as we had wished or the formality we had been told it would be. We sat in the waiting area for about an hour after presenting our passports and then were told to each pay fines of R24.83 (about £10).
However, instead of then informing us we could extend our visas, the policeman dealing with our case said we had to leave the country - until he noticed Jamie was holding a newborn baby!
He asked Kobra's age and then if we had a birth certificate. We didn't, having not yet registered her. So he said we had eight days in which to pay the fines and reappear with the certificate - or else the fines would start adding up (the maximum is R827.75 (for three months).
There was no flexibility, even when one policeman could see our predicament and requested some leniency be applied.
So we're now getting ready for the same journey again. Poor Kobra did tremendously well on her first excursion and trip by car, even if exposure to the noise and pollution of a city at her age was something we had hoped to avoid for much longer.
Returning to Piracanga, though, we felt relieved to be somewhere so peaceful and secluded, surrounded by nature and all its wonderful sounds and smells.
Abramsfamilyworldtravel tip: make sure you go early if you need to visit the Police Federal in Ilheus. The office closes at 11am.
On the other hand, the regs being the regs, maybe being the parents of a de facto Brazilian might get you different (and better) visa privileges...?
Posted by: Bill Moss | 04 May 2011 at 02:01 AM