Road To Canada Forums

Hello everyone! I am relatively new to the website although I have read many of the stories and experiences you have all had. I was hoping to tap into everyone's knowledge of the Immigration system because not all situations are covered in the government documents.

I thought I would give this a shot before contacting an attorney, so hopefully you can help us. One request... please do not reply with the generic Canadian Immigration website and say "everything you need is there". I have gone there. I have read until my eyes started bleeding. It may be all there, but it is far from clear and concise! If you have specific links to specific articles, that would be much more helpful, thanks :)

Here is the background:

Me: Canadian Citizen, 39, no kids
Girlfriend: American Citizen, 37, no kids

Some facts:
- we want to live in Canada (Vancouver)
- she currently has work commitments until June in the USA
- we will be getting married but want to wait until we can be together (June).

Is there a "preferred way" to get married that can help with the Immigration process?

What is the best way to get her up here? Some of the ideas I have had are for her to come here on a visitors visa (waved into the country), get married, and apply for PR. But in this situation would she be able to come and go between the US and Canada while the PR application is in progress? She would not be able to work here, so we were thinking of having her commute to the US to work while living in Vancouver... Is this doable? Some people have mentioned a Nexus pass... but the last thing I would want is a mix-up at the border while the PR application is being processed.

What is life like for a US citizen living in Canada while the PR app is ongoing? For example, could we fly to Hawaii for a honeymoon without fear of her being refused re-entry to Canada?

I suppose we would also like to know where to begin. Since we will not be married until June (or March at the earliest), what can we be doing now to help things along?

Thank you all in advance for reading this, and for supplying us with any suggestions and advice!!

Jay & Lisa

Here is what I did and I am an American citizen btw. Came to Canada on Visitor's record and after 1 month fell in love and married my Canadian wife in Canada. Gathered all my paperwork for the PR app and applied outland. Now I can leave and go the US to work but I haven't, I just applied for a visitor's extension and am staying put till the app gets processed. I did leave last summer for a month long vacation to the US and when I came back to Canada I had no troubles at the border because I had my new visitor's record with me so the border agents just passed me right through after trying to give me a hard time but they couldn't do much since I had my papers. If your spouse has to work in the US for the time being then I would suggest that you get married in Canada and have them return to the US to work till that obligation is finished and in the meantime you can apply outland to start the process, I don't know how commuting on a visitor's record would work I don't think you can come and go on a daily basis on a VR but I may be wrong. Hope this helps.

Suggest you read through the information on the US2Canada website first - that will help you come up with some specific questions on the process that you can ask about here.