As of January 1, Romania and Bulgaria have become full members of the Schengen area. This is the border-free part of the European Union that allows people to move between countries without visas. This has been a long time coming and while it is great news for many, there will be some that are not thrilled about it.
Romania and Bulgaria Join Schengen Area
The continent of Europe can be a bit confusing when it comes to the relationships that the countries have with each other. There is the European Union which is comprised of 27 nations. But, there is also the Eurozone, the countries that accept and trade in the Euro as the official currency. And, there is also the Schengen Zone or Area. This is the area that has 29 members (currently) that allows for border free travel.
Last year, Romania and Bulgaria had their air and sea border controls lifted and, as of January 1 of this year, the land border controls were lifted as well. This allows people to travel throughout without having to worry about border controls or visas.
By Rob984 – Derived from File:Schengen Area.svg, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=42820992
This is particularly significant for people in Greece. Before the land borders became part of Schengen Area, people could not travel by land from Greece to the rest of the Schengen Zone. Now, it is possible by traveling through Bulgaria and then Romania before entering Hungary.
This will increase the ease for foreigners who like the border-free travel the Schengen Zone affords so that they can now add Bulgaria and Romania to their European travels. Obviously, this will help Bulgaria and Romania with their tourism as well. I visited Romania for the first time last year (and headed back there in a couple of months) and found it to be a mixture of the Europe I was used to from living in Greece along with some of the Russian influence as well – overall, the area I was in was very charming and friendly. But, the mountain roads were something I did not want to have to deal with again since construction, at the time, bottlenecked it all to a single lane with no direction or person involved in the traffic pattern. 🙂
Romania has launched non-stop flights to New York City with Hi-Sky Airlines. Since air travel was already as part of the Schengen Area, this new change for Romania won’t make a change to that but it will be a nice advantage for those who may choose to fly to Romania and then take to the roads for Hungary or Greece – or anywhere else in the Schengen Zone.
I mentioned not everyone will be happy with this and it is a small segment of travelers who love to spend long periods of time in Europe. Since foreigners can only stay a maximum of 90 days (within 180 days) in the Schengen Zone, places like Croatia, Romania, and Bulgaria had been the countries that these travelers would go to spend up to 90 days in. This would reset their Schengen clock and allow them to return into the zone. But, with Croatia, Romania, and Bulgaria all now full members of the Schengen Area, this limits those available European countries significantly. There are still those that can be visited – in the gray block in the southern part of Europe in the map above, you have countries like North Macedonia, Kosovo, Bosnia, Albania, Serbia, and Montenegro that you can now stay in for those 90 days. Albania is a great option for many and it can be, along with some of those other countries, an inexpensive option to most European countries.
I know many friends I have in Romania and Bulgaria are now happy about the land border controls lifting to allow easier access to Greece. Indeed, many are and many people from Romania and Bulgaria travel to Greece in the summers. We used to see a ton of license plates from those countries and I can only imagine that increasing this summer!
