an extended schengen visa

I do not think that tourist stays of more than 90 days in a 180 day period are permitted. I suggest that first you contact the US Department of State (although there are those who would say that it is not a reliable source) and see if you can get guidance. The US Department of State's website suggests that it is impossible to stay as a tourist for more than 90 days in the Schengen Zone without getting a visa but it does not say how to get an extended visa. Check out http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_4361.html. After checking with the US Department of State if they say what the links above says, I would double check by contacting the embassy of your point of entry into the zone and then contact each of the other countries, especially the country where you will be when your 90 days run out and the countries that you plan to visit during the extra 30 days.

My link did not work. When you get there and get the 404 message, enter Schengen Fact Sheet in the search box and review the first result. ALso, you should do a search of Schengen Visa and extended or long term on this site or TripAdvisor and you will see the discussions and the issues that arise.

State Dept website.

There's no such thing as an "extended Schengen Visa". To stay beyond the 90 day window, you would need to apply for a visa from the individual country where you would spend the most time. I don't know the exact rules or how it's enforced, but supposedly, the visa only allows you extra time in that specific country, not the entire zone of the Schengen treaty. The rules vary per country, but at a minimum, you would need to demonstrate proof of adequate funds and health insurance to cover the length of your stay.

'Western Europe' and Schengen are not the same. With thoughtful planning additional visa concerns may not be necessary.

Okay, here's how it works. First, US DoS is not a player. They have no control and only relay what they think / guess is good scoop. It's not. The Schengen Accord only addresses an agreement among the signatories about how to uniformly handle short-term stays for tourist purposes. Stays for longer periods are solely the business of the individual nations. (So are work visas, etc.) Look at the embassy web sites of whatever country rings your bell. That's where the accurate information is. I needed one a couple years ago. Not because I was going to be in the Zone for 90 + X amount of consecutive time, but I was sure going to punch the number by a bunch in the course of a year. It was for tourist purposes only - - nothing tricky, no sneaking around. French and Spanish are pretty natural languages and I'd be in both countries. I looked at the scoop for both, picked the one with fewer hoops, and put the crap together. It took me an hour to gather the junk and copy it, write a short explanatory note, then run it by the bank to get it notarized on the way to the post office. Then I went on a trip. (I maintain two passports, just for this kind of contingency.) When I got back the visa was in the stacked up mail at the post office. I don't know how long it took, but obviously less than a month. I was in and out of the Zone a bunch of times. The visa was from Spain, but not near half the time was spent there, and I think the initial entry was through either Germany or France. There's not much to it........as long as you can honestly jump through the hoops without fudging.

And paraphrasing the note: I'm going to be all over the place as a tourist only and making multiple entries through unknown countries. My buddy who lives here has my phone and here's hers. I ain't broke. Thanks.

It was actually more like five years ago, so it's going to be hard to sort out from all the other trips, but here's about the way a think it went. Ed, probably the big difference is that today the whole thing is now online and can be accessed by any agency from the Schengen Area. The UK and Ireland also have access to the database even though they are not part of the Schengen Area. During the initial 100 days of operation in Switzerland, the Swiss police identified almost 900 people who were in the Schengen Area illegally...

There's no such thing as an "extended Schengen Visa". To stay beyond the 90 day window, you would need to apply for a visa from the individual country where you would spend the most time. I don't know the exact rules or how it's enforced, but supposedly, the visa only allows you extra time in that specific country, not the entire zone of the Schengen treaty. The rules vary per country, but at a minimum, you would need to demonstrate proof of adequate funds and health insurance to cover the length of your stay. As Tom says and yes the residence permit for one EU country does not allow you to go beyond the 90 days for the rest of Schengen Area. Deportation and a ban is to be expected if you are caught in breach of the rules.

Jim's proposition is interesting. Maybe I'm an outlaw, but I doubt it. It was actually more like five years ago, so it's going to be hard to sort out from all the other trips, but here's about the way a think it went. It started with an AF over-booking snafu at Roissy. We were offered gobs to skip the morning flight and take the afternoon one. More gobs in the afternoon. We worked the cycle two more days and one morning. Finally my then-unretired wife said she just had to get back to work. The way the money went was that you got X (plus meal and hotel vouchers) if you cashed the vouchers, 2X if you left them in the AF account - - no restrictions, you just payed the going rate when you ordered tickets. While you were flying on AF money you were also building AF miles. The money given to each of us at each increment was more than enough for a round trip ticket from home to France and back. Any unused money in the account expired at the end of two years. We had a neat problem on our hands and she was a year away from retirement. Some of the money went to European flights, some to flights elsewhere. I ordered up visas.

Now the fuzzy part. The first trip we got to Spain, but it would have been by driving after arriving at either de Gaulle or Ramstein. Other entries would have been at Dunkerque, Ramstein, Paris, and Frankfurt. There was probably at least one into Madrid or Barcelona and maybe one or two into Rota. We were careful to use only the passports with the Spanish visas. The visas were for a year, and my best guess is that in two years we probably spent nine months in the Schengen Zone. Whether that nine months was actually compressed int twenty-four or eighteen, I can't guess. Whether anybody ever looked at the visas or what was in the system I've no idea. It'd be interesting to try to figure out, but those passports have since expired and been chunked.

Anyway, it was clearly out in the open and nobody said squat. It'd be interesting to see a definitive statement precluding repeated / extensive movement among nations if you had the clear right to be in one for an extended period, but weren't permitted to travel among the others when there is no way to track the extent or duration of such movement. A visa traditionally assigns limited rights by the nation granting it that are parallel to the rights of its own citizens; e.g., freedom of movement, but not the right to vote. Also, laws are seldom made that are not enforceable. Beats me.

"First, US DoS is not a player. They have no control and only relay what they think / guess is good scoop. It's not." "Look at the embassy web sites of whatever country rings your bell. That's where the accurate information is." (emphasis mine) And that's why one goes to the US State Dept website, and is what makes them "a player". All of that info is clearly and neatly gathered into one place. Shana, as some of the others have said, it depends on where you're going. Since you didn't provide that info, all I can do is send you to the most general place so that you can start your own research. "I have found it very difficult to get information on how to apply for an extended visa. Can you send me to a good, reliable information source?" Where have you gone for info already? Perhaps we can clarify the situation for you - most info on the topic is more than a bit obtuse, unfortunately.

My understanding has always been that an extended stay visa only grants you the right to remain over 90 days in that country. It does not extend your stay in beyond 90 days in the rest of the Schengen zone. But perhaps I am mistaken. In Ed's case, it is very possible, and likely, that no one ever really checked his stays and visas, in large part because of the limited border controls now within the Schengen zone. But as Jim points out, more and more of passport controls are being checked electronically - which could make it very easy for your duration of stay to pop up on an agent's computer screen. Bottom line - you are getting free advice here from people, including me, that don't really know the exact laws and rules. You really need to reach out to the embassy or consulate of the country you wish to have a visa from (or several and pick the easiest application).

I went to the French government and Belgium Government's websites and the information I got there was this: A person holding a residence permit (what has been referred to as a visa in this thread) is permitted to travel to other countries within the Schengen zone for a maxium of 3 months out of a 6 months period (although Belgium refers to it as a "semester"). You have to maintain a residence in the country for which you were issued the residence permit, and must return to that residence after your 3 months abroad. Hopefully that helps.