The Time I Was In A Country For 3 Days But Had A Passport Stamp In And Out On The Same Day!

“Johnny ‘crackers’ Knoxville” – Chris Bilsland.

The Time I Was In A Country For 3 Days But Had A Passport Stamp In And Out On The Same Day! This has to be a nuts one. Doesn’t it?

I arrived back in Tunis, Tunisia in December 2024 in what was an absolutely sentimental return…you see I was flaying back to Tunisia, the country where I had celebrated my 100th country back in March 2015. On that previous trip, I backpacked Tunisia hardcore, visiting Teboulba, Mahdia, Sidi Bou Said, Carthage, Kairouan, Monastir, Tunis and Sousse.

Here on Friday 13th December, I boarded a flight in Milan, Italy bound for Tunis, Tunisia.

That night we arrived in Tunis, Tunisia at 23.45 (11.45 p.m.) on Friday 13th December 2024. By the time we got to immigration, it had gone midnight and therefore my passport stamp was a piece of fake news. It said I arrived in Tunisia on Saturday 14th December 2024, the following day after my flight landed, well by 16 minutes!

See below, my passport stamp was on the 14th December!

We headed straight to our Hotel, El Hana International and had some Beluga Vodka and orange juice on Marek’s Birthday Weekend.

We then slept a bit and had a day backpacking and reminiscing the sights and bars of Tunis. This included the Clock Tower at Habib Bourgiba Avenue and the bar Brasserie Les Deux Avenues, famous only for me as I celebrated my 100th country here in 2015. It was a wild day where we went backpacking, sightseeing, drinking and lunching in downtown Tunis…I did that textbook nutbook “same photo in the same places years on” thing…

“It’s the same room but everything’s different; you can fight the sleep but not the dream” – Neil Finn.

After that, around sunset we headed back to Tunis Carthage International Airport. Marek stormed for a taxi – he was actually suitcasing it here while I backpacked it! Generation Gap…

We got to the airport around sunset so it was still Saturday 14th December 2024 and we were due to leave THAT day…we posed for some more photos, I was reminiscing loyal.

This was still our second day in Tunisia yet by passport stamp still classed as our first day! Our flight was supposed to be at 21.30 (9.30 p.m.) and we were checked in and through immigration and security by 20.00. So surely we would be leaving on Day 2, or passportstampily, Day 1!

Then we heard of a 40 minute delay. We grabbed some duty free and waited. We shared a bottle of Tunisian red wine!

Then the delay changed to 2 hours. Then it changed to 4 hours. I headed back to Duty Free which was open until midnight. I bought a different bottle of Tunisian red wine and a gin and tonic for Marek and I to share.

It was Marek’s Birthday at midnight so we sipped our final glasses of red wine before boarding the flight to Nouakchott in Mauritania.

By the time we boarded our flight it was now into day 3!! We finally flew off just after 12.30 a.m. In the below photo, Marek is in his third calendar day in Tunis, yet our passports show we were there on only one day!

So I was in Tunisia on that trip for 24.75 hours, yet it spanned THREE calendar days!! It is the only time I have done that. Although I also once spent 4 days in Kuwait which went down as 2 days on the passport stamps!

Here are some videos from my 3 days in Tunisia which shows up as 1 day:

Here is my original video from the drinks to celebrate my 100th country in Tunis, Tunisia in 2015: