Jen McKen Photography

Elizabeth - Hi Jen,
We took a trip to Jamaica last year… before we left, we realized that the resort we had originally booked was similar in nature, long ways from the beach. We booked another resort and it was cheaper and we saved more. One of the nice perks of saving some money, though, was that it allowed us to get private transportation from the airport to the resort…So no shuttles for us! We were greeted by our personal driver in a nice town car. He drove us straight to the resort and then picked us up for our return. This being our first trip, I didn’t realize that the airport shuttles stop along the way at each resort to drop off guests. We learned this from other guests later on. This would have taken us longer to arrive to our destination, which was about 1 hour away.

We booked through an online service and had an representative from that company each at the airport and at the resort. Great service and someone who helped us book and plan our excursions!! I’ll be happy to share the name of the company if you’d like.

Overall, great post!! You mentioned some things that I hadn’t thought about doing before and I can remember for our anniversary trip next year.

Kristin - Jen, I totally agree with everything except the passport thing. I know for a fact bc we just went to Punta Cana this summer. My husband, one year old daughter and I had one room and my parents were staying in another. Two weeks before we were to leave, my husband’s grandparents wanted to join us…..but their passports expired 2 days after we would return (we left 8/6, returned 8/13 and their passports expired 8/15). Keep in mind these are 80 year old +++ adults. Our travel agent did not want to book them because of this reason. I called the United States immigration AND passport offices to ask if any such requirements from the US side existed and even after telling them the conversation would be recorded (in case We had any problems later) and they said NO such requirement existed, nor could I find any requirement on any of the passport requirement sites.

Likewise, I made the same calls to the Dominican Republic embassy and they said the same thing….there is no such requirement for the Dominican Republic.

As long as your passport is still valid the day you return to the country, by the official rules/regulations of both countries, it doesn’t matter the expiration date.

However, my husband’s grandparents were aware of the risk/logistical nightmare if a hurricane delayed return, they had a heart attack/injury/etc that delayed their return, etc but that was a risk they were willing to take.

I have personal experience in Europe that I know you don’t need extra time before expiration as my passport expired 29 days after I returned from Italy and I called US Passport and Italian embassy to verify no such requirements existed. They suggest having 3-6 months left but do not have requirements.

You just have to check with the country you are traveling to as there are some that want you to have extra time from your return to passport expiration.