This is disappointing as a foreign traveler, since it helps to have stable friendly countries in Europe outside of the Schengen you can go to during times you want to reset your visa timer. For me, one of my favorite destinations for this was Croatia, where honestly you could use euros to pay for things much of the time anyway, although I mostly used a card so it auto-converted to kuna as necessary.
With this change, it means to be outside the Schengen you must now either go to less stable/safe countries, or go to the UK which is very expensive. I think you still have the option to go to Bulgaria to stay in the EU without being in Schengen, but otherwise I guess the next best option now in Montenegro, however I'm not sure how stable it is currently since it primarily existed on a tourist economy serving Russians.
While your point is valid, I can't help but smile. I men, first world problems?
It does however highlight how things that are of benefit to millions, (or at least, hopefully of benefit to those millions) can have unexpected (?) impact on the few.
As a completely alternate anecdote, I'm planning to attend a conference there in 2024,and this change has made it a lot more attractive :)
> As a completely alternate anecdote, I'm planning to attend a conference there in 2024,and this change has made it a lot more attractive :)
I've visited Croatia about a million times in 2012-2022 (that includes pre-EU), and the border controls were almost always a non-story. They'd see the cover of an EU passport (or even the car plates) and would just wave at us to go through.
I was stopped once to have my bag searched for drugs, because you know, long hair = obviously must be smuggling drugs. But that happened near other borders too (even inside Schengen; I used to hitch hike a lot).
The change has pretty much no impact on EU countries or a countries with a visa arrangement with Schengen however it made visiting Croatia for countries without a Schengen visa agreement much more difficult.
I actually wonder if it would end up being a net benefit or not because of its impact on tourism from Asia and MENA.
As a holder of a not popular passport, it’s great that now I can visit Croatia without going through an additional lengthy and expensive visa application process.
I beg to differ. I was on a road trip in Bosnia once, and I will never go inside a car in that country again. Roads are poor. Speed limits are more like a rough suggestion. The local drivers are absolutely insane: they take over really aggressively, even with traffic coming from the opposite direction. I thought everything was just "ok standard crazy" (I've lived in Greece, Croatia, etc so I had an idea), until our car was taken over in a narrow tunnel, on a right curve - the driver behind us (or the guy on the opposite lane) would've had ZERO chance.
Where did you live in Croatia? Because Croatian drivers are exactly the same as that, and even worse are the Slovenians who drive here. I recently avoided certain death by a fraction of a second because some idiot decided to overtake half a kilometer of cars around a blind curve at 120km/h.
Roads are probably better in Croatia but the drivers are most certainly not.
I lived in Zagreb & area, trips further east were very occasional, but we visited the coast regularly. Highways and better roads do help a lot, it's also an observation I've had when living in Poland, where the highway infrastructure has been around for a while, but many people still remember the old roads. You're in a hurry, but the road is bad, so you drive more aggressively, because the bad road & conditions slow you down. But as the roads improve, you get used to getting somewhere in X time consistently and without hassle, so there's no point in driving like crazy. Another friend living in Poland has also observed that a lot of traffic accidents in the past few years involved Ukrainian drivers, which would make sense if their road infrastructure is less developed = they still feel the need to drive more aggressively.
Unfortunately the main highway from Zagreb towards the coast is regularly subject to traffic jams in the summer, which definitely doesn't help. But overall I'd still say it's a radically safer place to drive than Bosnia, I've seen more insane drivers in 2 days there than in ~2 years of Croatia.
A lot of tourists go to Croatia for it's beaches and coastal towns. Even though Bosnia and Herzegovina has a tiny bit of coast, it is a classic inland country.
Concerning safety, you often have trouble communicating with locals, (comparatively) high corruption and an unstable economy. They are steadily improving but are not quite at the same level as Croatia.
Appart from that, they are not part of the EU and normally don't accept euros.
With this change, it means to be outside the Schengen you must now either go to less stable/safe countries, or go to the UK which is very expensive. I think you still have the option to go to Bulgaria to stay in the EU without being in Schengen, but otherwise I guess the next best option now in Montenegro, however I'm not sure how stable it is currently since it primarily existed on a tourist economy serving Russians.