Schengen Visa for europe
 

Myself and my partner are planning a 3-4 week ride around Europe. My other half is Thai and has just got a 6 month extenstion for the UK so she now qualifies for a Schengen visa. What's the easiest way to apply for one (and cheapest). I hear France and Italy are easiest, we're planning to start in France, visit Spain to Portugal, through to Italy and up to Slovakia before returning home via Germany.

Thanks.

My understanding is whichever country issues the Schengen Visa should be your first point of entry into the Schengen Area on first use of that Visa. It is only 'validated' by the first entry stamp.

But make sure that it is 'validated' properly. My Partner is Russian and before she acquired UK citizenship, we always had great difficulty getting the French officials at Eurotunnel to stamp her Visas (issued by France) - they just wanted to wave us through without even looking at our Passports (RUS and UK use a similar maroon colour). They only did it when we showed them the Visa. Must have had good lunches!

When applying for later Visas, the country will look to see that theirs was the most visited country. They dont want to issue them if, apart from the initial use, you keep going to another country more than their own.