Expedited Passports

Christmas is almost here, which means that people all over the country are traveling to see their families, both inside and outside of the US. The Sacramento Bee reports that each year, 1 million Mexican citizens return home to Mexico over Christmas break. That’s a lot of people, and that’s not even counting members of their families who are US citizens and likely traveling with them.

Holiday trips are more complicated when your family lives out of the country. Remember, if you’re crossing the border, even into Canada or Mexico, you’ll need a passport if you’re traveling by plane. In fact, it’s a good idea to have a passport even if you’re driving, just in case something comes up and you need to fly back. In the article referenced above, many Mexican citizens were getting passports from the Mexican consulate, which was able to issue them immediately. What about American citizens? How can they get 24 hour passports? If you’re a US citizen planning on going out of the country for the holidays, hopefully you already have your passport ready to go. But what if you don’t?

At this point, you’ll need to get a 24 hour passport to spend Christmas out of the country. The best way to get a 24 hour passport is to go through a private passport expediting agency like RushMyPassport.com. A private passport expediter can deliver your passport documents to the US government by hand the same day, and then rush your newly issued passport back to you. For extra piece of mind, some private passport expediters even let you track your 24 hour passport order through every step of the process.

The holidays are here! Most people have time away from work and kids are out of school, so now is a great time to travel. Holiday events and festivals make this an especially magical time to visit someplace new, and you can often find last-minute travel deals that make traveling more affordable.

If you have kids, why not take them to visit Santa?  Where does Santa Claus live, anyway? Every child knows that Santa lives at the North Pole. However, geographically speaking, the North Pole is at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean. In reality, Santa maintains a number of different residences and workshops.  Since 1953, he has lived in North Pole, Alaska . Every year, the town has a North Pole Christmas in Ice Festival. Among other attractions, this year’s festival features a giant, illuminated ice sculpture of a frozen turkey. Don’t try to take a bite, unless you want to end up like the kid in A Christmas Story! Of course, there’s also the Santa Claus House, with Santa Claus, his reindeer and a gift shop selling Santa-approved presents.

Before Alaska claimed him as their own, Santa lived in the Lapland region of Finland. You can still visit him there year round at Santa’s Village. (How does Santa manage to live in two places at once? Magic!) Santa’s Village features Santa Claus, his workshop, snow, igloos and reindeer galore.

If you want to take the kids to see Santa in Lapland, of course, you’ll need passports.  Don’t forget to get child passports for the kids-even babies need child passports to leave the country. If you’re just going to Alaska, you don’t need a passport if you have a direct flight. However, if you have a flight that stops in Canada, or if you plan on crossing the border into Canada, you will need a passport.

If you don’t have a passport and would like to go before Christmas, all is not lost. You can use an expediting service like RushMyPassport.com to get a passport (or a child passport) in just one day!