Anyone over wintering in Crete Agios Nikolao

[wryanddry]

Hello forum members,

We are in the process of buying a sailboat in which we intend to Cruise the Med in 2018. We currently plan to over winter in Agios Nikolao on Crete and wonder if anyone else on the forum has over wintered there or plans to this season. We should be there from mid November to early April 2018. We have 2 kids, age 6 and 9 and would love to have some other kids around for ours to play with. We have not booked yet so if there is another popular location we would be open to changing plans. We heard Turkey was popular but recent customs law changes have made it less so.

Thanks in advance

Clive and Nichole

[chuckr]

Interesting -- have you checked out Schengen yet??

[wryanddry]

Yes, fortunately I carry a British passport, so I am OK until the Brexit thing shakes itself out. More concerned with returning to Canada as I have landed immigrant status. Not enough time to get citizenship before the trip so have to research when I have to come back and for how long to avoid losing status. So many rules!!

[wryanddry]

Just found out it used to be 6 months before having to return for a period. Now it is based on the validity of the Permanent Resident card. PR card is valid for 5 years, you have to be in Canada for 2 of those 5 years, so effectively I can be absent from Canada for 3 years without issue.

However my wife and kids are travelling on Canadian Passports, I think I can get my kids British passports but Nichole would take longer because she would have to do a bunch of paperwork etc to prove heritage, her father or grandfather was from UK. However I did read somewhere that as we are a family, there is a EU law that prevents families being separated and that as I have a UK passport and am entitled to stay in the EU we would be OK.

More research to do!!