Non-EEA wife travelling to France w/o a visa

[joeprice90]

Hello all

So my wife has a UK residence card. She is working as a teacher here in the UK. We want to visit France over Christmas but we have left it too late it seems and all of the visa appoinemts at the French visa centre are full until January!

We are considering just showing up at the eurotunnel with everything booked and with all of our supporting documents and trying to obtain a stamp on the border. We plan to cite Article 5.4 of Directive 2004/38/EC to support out claim.

Has anyone done this before or heard of any success stories doing it?

Thanks

[iwolga]

What kind of UK residence card does your wife have?

[obormot]

There is a lot of discussion about this at "EEA route" subforum - search there.
My impression is that if she has 5 years EU residence card, then it might work, and with PR it might be more difficult. Basically, her residence needs to show "family member of EU citizen" and mention of your name.
If you are UK citizen, and she has Residence obtained via UK law, then I am less sure, what might happen.

Some people were also telling about having very unpleasant experience with eurostar border control. It might be that ferry through the channel is a safer bet.. (or even a plane - just do not do low cost like easyjet, they do not know immigration rules; you have better chance with Air France or BA)