Originally Posted by borjigit

you then have no living address in Saudi, how do you get your Iqama? your multi entry visa? bank account, cell phone,... from Saudi? I guess they all require an address in Saudi.

Thanks

Originally Posted by Backinthesand

Alighor - I do the commute every day - once you work out the best timing it's fine. Usually the actual 25km of the Causeway takes me 20 minutes in the morning and about 40 minutes in the evening. At the moment during Ramadan it's very quiet, will get busier and I usually try to hit the bridge on a Thursday not later than 1pm, and generally about 4.45pm every other day.

The stages, from Bahrain, are:
1. Insurance - drive up, pay your money get the paper - I buy 6 months at a time (BD40), or you can get monthly for BD18, Weekly for BD8.5 or daily - but why would you.
2. Toll booth - drive up to the window pay your 2 BD drive on - apparently there is a prepaid card you can get I heard it lasts 30 days and you get about a 20% discount, I'm just lazy and can't be ar*ed to check it out.
3. Bahrain Traffic - drive up, collect your paper, drive on
4. Bahrain Passports - drive up, hand over passport (plus Causeway book, if you have one (saves passport pages)), get stamped (sometimes), drive on
5. Saudi Passports - drive up, hand over passport, get it back (eventually) drive on
6. Saudi Customs - drive up, queue a bit, park, get out, open boot, hand over traffic paper from Bahrain Traffic, get it stamped, close boot, drive on
7. Last booth - hand over stamped bit of paper, wait for barrier to go up, drive on.

From Saudi - same but in reverse, rarely have to get out at the Bahrain customs on the way back in.

"Middle Island" houses the 7 checkpoints, over about 1.5km, the other 25km are allegedly 80kmh speed limit but no-one does it, just watch out for (very) occasional speed traps.

There are occasions, of course, when the silly ones decide that your visa has expired or something daft and then you have to park, go into the office and sort it out, so yep than can happen, but it's relatively rare.

I lived in Khobar for several years and the quality of life in Bahrain, even with the "troubles" far outweighs the commute, especially when you have family with you. I've done the commute, and on to Jubail, every day for the last year and have no regrets about the decision to live in Bahrain.