Yes, an EU embassy can issue special visas in exceptional cases, even if they do not fit the standard types of visas. These may be granted based on specific circumstances or urgent needs, but they are not commonly available.
which is what i have been saying all along, but i could not verify even that answer. the reference links didn't contain any text that would confirm this. so i didn't bring it up here.
asking further i get that a long-stay visa should be possible as long as he spend less than 90 days in each specific country, and maybe he has to travel back and forth between the chosen long-stay country and the countries he wants to walk through, but in practice, without checks, or without explicit registration every time he crosses an inner-EU border, how would anyone know? i guess 3 months could be enough for each EU country he passes through, so maybe that could work.
that too, i already concluded from the basic search i did before and from your comments. given that the AI answer here only confirms what i already understood, combined with the unreliability of AI in general, i don't find AI helpful enough to be worth it.
>Yes, an EU embassy can issue special visas in exceptional cases
This is garbage from the very beginning, since the EU does not have embassies. All the embassies belong to individual EU countries, further demonstrating that visa arrangements are done on national level.
> a long-stay visa should be possible as long as he spend less than 90 days in each specific country, and maybe he has to travel back and forth between the chosen long-stay country and the countries he wants to walk through
This is exactly what I told you. So basically it is exactly how he has it today (can travel 90 days out of 180), except:
1. The non-travel days he can spend at his base in Mexico, instead of unfamiliar country.
2. Doesn't have to do bureucracy in order to get a long-stay visa. You are severely underestimating how difficult this process is. Imho he wouldn't even be able to get it, at least I don't see compelling reasons to give him a visa by any of the EU countries.
> in practice, without checks, or without explicit registration every time he crosses an inner-EU border, how would anyone know?
Because he is famous enough (and certainly will be after he finishes his trip) for the officials to pay attention. He doesn't want to get an EU-wide ban, especially before completing his journey.
i understood the long stay visa differently: since you can spend the whole year in the EU there is no limit on traveling except he can't spend more than 90 days in any single EU country (besides the one he got the visa for), but even if that is wrong, if he gets the visa for the largest country to traverse, which i think is france, then he could: enter france, travel to another eu country, walk 90 days, go back to france, walk 90 days in france, travel to another EU country walk 90 days, go back to france, finish walking. if he still has a leg left at that point, wait until the 90 days are full, then finish the remaining leg. i don't know how much time he really needs, but i think the whole EU needs less than a year. 180days outside of france could be enough.
with "how would anyone know?" i meant the reverse. if there are no stamps that document the travel within the EU, how can he prove that he did not violate the rules?
all in all, these visa rules are way to complicated. it sounds like that without the EU existing, he would have had 90 days in each european country mostly visa free. so that is in effect a regression. as a EU citizen i am not happy about that.
i traveled across europe before the schengen area was created, and there was no problem entering any country and stay there other than some countries charging a lot for the visa at the border. anyone with a british or US or similar "powerful" passport would have been able to do the same.
if i ask AI i get this:
Yes, an EU embassy can issue special visas in exceptional cases, even if they do not fit the standard types of visas. These may be granted based on specific circumstances or urgent needs, but they are not commonly available.
which is what i have been saying all along, but i could not verify even that answer. the reference links didn't contain any text that would confirm this. so i didn't bring it up here.
asking further i get that a long-stay visa should be possible as long as he spend less than 90 days in each specific country, and maybe he has to travel back and forth between the chosen long-stay country and the countries he wants to walk through, but in practice, without checks, or without explicit registration every time he crosses an inner-EU border, how would anyone know? i guess 3 months could be enough for each EU country he passes through, so maybe that could work.
that too, i already concluded from the basic search i did before and from your comments. given that the AI answer here only confirms what i already understood, combined with the unreliability of AI in general, i don't find AI helpful enough to be worth it.