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Longer Stay in CR/CA

6 years ago
My family and I will be doing a year-long trip to Central America and using CR as our 'home base'. We will arriving to, departing from, and visiting CR multiple times over the year. We will likely fly in to Liberia. I have a number of questions I could use some help with:

1) We have a strong preference for buying a used vehicle there over driving down with ours. I have heard about car-buying services and it seems that, for tourists (like us), they have value. Can anyone recommend such a service for Liberia?

2) Border jumping. I read a bit about this. Our plans will ensure that we are not restricted by CR's or other countries restrictions on duration of stay. However, it seems that CR requires some kind of onward ticket or proof of departure. Cost wise, it would be cheapest not to buy return flights just to have to move them once or multiple times to support the need to have proof of departure every time we enter/re-enter CR (or all the other countries for that matter). Any recommendations on this?

3) Cell services. Canada is the biggest rip off country when it comes to cell service costs, so I am hopeful this will be cheaper and easier. Is it easy to find plans with unlimited data? Are there providers that cover multiple countries in Central America? Can one even get plans without a permanent address?

4) Anyone have any experience with longer-term travel/health insurance, such as Allianz Global Assistance Expatriate insurance or similar?

Lots of questions but I thought I would start with a few. I know we are not moving there and won't become expats, but a year long stay seems to bring into many considerations that expats might be in the best position to answer. Any insight would be appreciated.

Gracias,
M

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William Russell
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