It’s a nice excuse for a day trip, and it’s exactly the sort of bureaucratic bobbing and weaving that is essential to living in a socialized country.
Today, we bought bus tickets that we will never use, from Costa Rica’s border town of San Vito to Panama, for 90 days from now. These will replace the plane tickets that we will not use in two weeks, and allow us to stay in the country for another 90 days.
Sounds confusing? It is.
Lemme explain.
Or, in the words of Inigo Montoya,
No, there is too much. Let me sum up.
Costa Rica does not allow you to enter the country indefinitely. You must have a prepurchased ticket out of the country (as in, say, the second leg of a round tip ticket) upon your entry.
Your passport is stamped to authorize you to stay in the country for a maximum of ninety days. If you are found to have extended your stay beyond this limit, you can be deported to your home country and not allowed back.
