Passport Renewal
To continue on with our post from January 9th, we had another interesting week. Our old / existing passports expire in less than one year so we thought we should get going on it sooner than later. We certainly don't want to travel back to Vancouver and then wait around for them to be processed – especially when we could be sitting here in the Caribbean instead.
We filled out the forms for our new passport applications and then we looked at the details of the passport photo requirements. Apparently they are supposed to be a different dimension from the photos we had done for our extension of stay here in Barbados - we had some extras but we can't use them for Canadian passports. Ooops... We learned that passport photo requirements are different for each country's policies and bureaucratic needs. Who knew? Good thing we checked that out before heading in with our applications.
The photo shop that we used for our extension of stay photos (see Dec 5 post) is located a half block away from us, and they said that they don't do photos for Canadian passports. Apparently they don't have the dimensions set up in their computer. I didn't ask the obvious question as I was being polite that morning..... and instead asked where we could get them done. She told me we had to go to the lower end of the island, past the south side of Bridgetown, where their other photo shop is located. It's the same company, and it seems they could do them....same company.... good grief.... A quick search on google told me that this was indeed the only place in the country where Canadians can get their passport photos taken and prepared to meet the specifications. And now it's a day's travel, along with a lunch date with my sweetie pie so we can spend Bds$19.95 each on tiny little pictures. Alrighty then...off we go on Tuesday morning to have yet another wild bus ride.
They gave us instructions on how to get there: get off at the Esso station in the Hastings area of Christ Church, and walk a block or two to the tall building and then they were located across the street. OK - we can do that. Off we go. Apparently there are two Esso stations in Hastings but they are about 2 km apart. We didn't figure that out until after the bus dropped us and was gone. We had to ask someone in the nearby bank for directions. It was a long walk in the heat of the day. As it turned out, the "tall" building showed up - it was three stories high - and the photo shop was right there across the street. Needless to say our photos have a nice pink reflective glow to them from the long walk in the mid-day sun. The cool air hit us hard when we entered the air conditioned photo shop and seemed to make us glow even more. And yes, the photos also have that mandatory unfriendly / non-smiling / doughty look to them.
OK - it's early afternoon on Tuesday, and now that we are armed with our typically ugly new photos that will remain on our passports for 10 years, and have completed the forms for a quickie renewal, we are all pumped up and excited to grab a taxi and head to the Canadian High Commission so we can git-er-dun. We noticed on the website before we left home that they are open from 9am to 4:30 pm. Awesome!
We arrive at the main gate and the nice lady behind the thick glass asks what business we need to do. We tell her, and that we have everything we need. She says the people who work on passport renewals are only in the office from 9am to noon, and it's almost 2pm... Aaaaargh.... So off we go for a nice warm 20 minute walk into Bridgetown so we can catch the next bus home. A cool shower, a nap, happy hour at the beach to watch the sunset....and then a treat for dinner out at "Just Grillin". Tomorrow will be better.
Wednesday was a busy day doing nothing, so we decided Thursday (today) would be a better day to try the passport thing again... Off we go on the bus. We get to Bridgetown and decide it's cool enough to walk the 3 km to the High Commission Office. We notice as we are getting close that the streets leading there are actually up hill somewhat and our bottles of water have almost been drained... Whew! A bit warm and red faced when we get there....happy to be in the a/c.
Déjà vu... same routine as before, provide ID to the commissionaire, get through the secure gates again, walk through body scanners just like at the airport, bag scanners, and receive the obligatory stern stares from the hatted and badged security guards, and being careful to leave all of our electronic stuff behind at the front entrance this time. So with completed forms in hand, along with Passport photos and a Visa card ready to dole out CAN$265.00 for each of us... ouch!... inside we go. We are directed to the small interview room again where we get to sit down and speak with the helpful lady on the other side of the bullet proof glass window.
The forms were reviewed by the nice lady behind the bullet proof glass - we had a few spots that we left blank because we had questions that need clarification - and they were then combined together with our existing passports for airmail to Ottawa. Payment was made. The old passports will be returned to us along with the new ones in about 2 or 3 weeks. We still need to keep the old passports as they are stamped with our current Barbados visitor's expiry date.
It sure was good that we thought ahead to renew our passports while we were here in Barbados with the Canadian High Commission Office being close by - they don't have one in Grenada.... Now we don't have to worry about the expiry dates for a while, and, who knows where we might go next...