Visiting Nauru March 2019

Spending a few days in Nauru is straightforward nowadays.

The visa process is simple via e-mail. You need to contact Nauru immigration to receive a list of what they need from you and an immigration form to fill out. AFAIK visas are only available directly from Nauru immigration nowadays.
An AirBnB-booking is fine for the confirmed accomodation. All scanned documents can be send to them via e-mail. After a while I got an invoice for the 50 AUD visa-fee, which has to be paid in advance. A few days after payment they sent me the tourist visa approval letter, which is a must to board any Nauru-Airlines flight to Nauru.

I arrived on the flight from Fiji early in the morning. At immigration at Nauru airport I got a visa stamped in my passport (takes up a full page) and that was it. No need any more to leave your passport with them and collect it later.

There is an ATM at the airport run by Bendigo Bank. Don´t know which cards it takes, since I brought cash with me.
I rented a car from my AirBnB host for 70 AUD per day. There is no car-rental agency on Nauru. No taxis and public busses neither. Busses driving around are for the refugees only.

My flight back to Fiji was delayed by 18 hours and my Air-Bnb-host told me, that his last guest had a 24h-delay flying out. So be flexible with that.

I liked my stay there. Of course Nauru is for country collectors mainly. Yet people are friendly and it felt great exploring that tiny country a bit. There is a museum now close to to Parliament.

Have a good trip.

Interesting how the world changes quickly :-)

I spent a week in Nauru five years ago, when the country-collection mania wasn't so spread yet. It was impossible to book any accommodation, there were only three hotels, they were fully booked by Australian government personnel, and hotels took not less than a week to answer each email.

As far as I could find out back then, there were no ATMs in the island.

The visa procedure was really unclear and slow: I sent an email to every address listed in the government website and nobody replied, then finally a Finnish lady, on a CouchSurfing blog, gave me the address of some lady who worked for the embassy in Brisbane, and she arranged the visa for me. Overall, taking into account all the waiting times between an email and another, and the fact that Our Airlines changed of several days both my arrival and departure flights from Majuro (and every time I had to restart the visa procedure with different dates), it took me exactly two months to obtain the official approval. It was actually just an email stating that I was permitted to enter Nauru, there was no printable visa: when I landed, I handed over my passport to the immigration officials, and I cam back after two days to pick it up with a stamped visa on it.

But the visa was free back then. I see that the government is now making some additional money on country collectors, it's a good idea. If they weren't already receiving all the UN money, I think Tuvalu would do the same.

Now that Nauru became easy to visit, I think the only territory left in the Pacific for which the entry rules are unclear is Tokelau (besides of course American Samoa, unless the country stated in your passport wasn't part of NATO during the cold war).

Could you tell me the email address you used to make your visa application? Several months ago, I asked Rajeev, the Nauru government guy, to send me an application form. He did that, but when I recently sent the completed application form back to him, it was returned to me as ‘undeliverable’. So I have now sent the completed application form to the Nauru Brisbane office, but have yet to receive a reply. (I may be being a little impatient about this last try.) I am hoping to go to Nauru as part of a South Pacific tour fairly soon. Thanks!

If it can help, the one that worked for me was <Charisma.Capelle@brisbane.gov.nr>. It was 5 years ago, so it's possible that it's not in use anymore, in which case the OP is the best person to help you.

The email I used to communicate with Rajeev was rajeevnauruimmigration@gmail.com . No problems at all.

Thanks for both your replies. I appreciate your help.

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