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I have French Schengen Visa and planning to land in Spain stay few days then continue to France where most of my trip will happen. I'm confused whether I can land in Spain. One consulate said I could, but other said they don't recognize Travel Document from USA. Anyone recently traveled to Spain with RTD? Thanks!

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    Does your French visa have any restrictions noted? Related question, which appears to confirm the opinion of the Chicago Spanish Consulate that you cannot enter Spain with a RTD from the USA travel.stackexchange.com/questions/135790/…
    – Traveller
    Commented Jul 12, 2019 at 22:14
  • Not that I know of. Interesting! Why did LA Consulate say I can travel if I have reentry permit...
    – Nanina
    Commented Jul 12, 2019 at 22:36
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    What is your citizenship? You could try checking Timatic timaticweb2.com/integration/… Which Consulate did you ask first? And why did you ask two?
    – Traveller
    Commented Jul 12, 2019 at 22:38
  • I have Serbian citizenship - which is a Schengen Area and I don't need visa to travel to any European country, but because I need to travel with Travel Document then I need visa. I asked two, cause I read on their website that they can't issue visa for RTD, but read that people went to Spain and they had visa issued from Spain, so I wanted to confirm.
    – Nanina
    Commented Jul 12, 2019 at 22:55
  • @Nanina Serbia is not in the Schengen area. Also, if you get or use a Serbian passport, you might put your refugee status in jeopardy.
    – phoog
    Commented Jul 13, 2019 at 3:17

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If you use an RTD from any non-EU country, then you will need a visa to seek entry to the Schengen area. You already have that from the French diplomatic mission. Which consulates told you yes and no?

If this is a Visa C with validity in the Schengen States (Etats Schengen) then you should be able to land in Spain and move on to France. The border guard would be well within their rights to question you about your itinerary but if you are honest and show them that the majority of your trip will be in France (flight to France and back home to USA, along with hotel reservation in France with a duration exceeding that of your stay in Spain), then you should have no issues.

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  • Thanks for your replay. Spanish consulate in LA said yes, but Chicago's Spanish consulate said they checked and it's not possible to travel to Spain. If I do - I would be illegally in Spain - that's what they said. I do have Schengen Visa - which technically should be valid in any Schengen area country...
    – Nanina
    Commented Jul 12, 2019 at 21:40
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    @Ozzy Are you sure your answer is correct? See the related question I linked to above
    – Traveller
    Commented Jul 12, 2019 at 22:17
  • @Traveller digging further into this now, that thread gives some anecdotal evidence. And it's interesting that they added exceptions to that person's visa and not this poster's. Will update
    – Ozzy
    Commented Jul 13, 2019 at 0:27
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    @MichaelHampton The Spanish government not recognizing it won't stop the US from distributing it because others (probably most countries) do recognize it.
    – Ozzy
    Commented Jul 13, 2019 at 5:53
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    Indeed, but we're discussing the USA here, not the UK? Further, not finding anything else useful on the Spanish embassy website, I also checked Timatic, which says the US refugee travel document is OK.
    – Michael Hampton
    Commented Jul 13, 2019 at 6:01

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