Our final task in Baja was to get on the ferry and head to the mainland.
Essentially there are two options here. Baja Ferries or the TMC Ferry. Baja Ferries is the classic passenger ferry and TMC is the trucker’s ferry. Since TMC allows you to stay with your vehicle for the 18 hour passage we decided to go with them.
We pulled in to the ferry terminal and took a quick left into the parking lot. This costs $22 Pesos. The vehicle import office is on the north end of the building you just parked in front of.
First thing to do was import our vehicle into Mexico (this isn’t required for Baja so that’s why it’s happening now). We walked up to the import office with our passports, tourist cards, and vehicle registration and hoped for the best. In 10 minutes they took $44 USD for import permit, a deposit of $200 USD for the truck to enter the country, copies of our passports, and copies of our tourist cards. They gave us a decal for the windshield to tell everyone we’re legit.
The next step was to book the ferry itself. We were told to arrive a couple days in advance to book the ferry so we really didn’t know what day we would be able to get on. We drove through customs to the TMC office, they put the truck on a scale, and we had a ticket booked for later that day.
After heading to La Paz to stock up on provisions, we arrived at the terminal for the 5pm sailing at 2:30pm and they sent us straight on the boat. Since we didn’t have enough room to open our roof top tent we opted to pull some of our junk out of the back and sleep in the canopy. It took some sweet contortionist moves, but eventually both of us were tucked into bed for the 18hr trip across the Sea of Cortez. We just kept the back open to keep a nice breeze flowing through (and to fight the claustrophobia).
18 Hours later we’d be starting a new adventure!
Yes, Ashley is in the truck reading and relaxing!
Can you spot us?
Disembarking onto the mainland!
Very informative post, I printed it off and will use it for our crossing in March. How was communicating with the TMC people? Or maybe your spanish is good?
It was also good to confirm the vehicle import can be done there, thanks
Yves
Yves,
Our Spanish is virtually nonexistent. It was still very easy communicating with the TMC staff.
Good luck on your journey!
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How much did it cost to book the ferry?
Can you share what the cost of your TMC ferry ticket for the vehicle and forthe both of you? How does it compare to the cost of the passenger ferry? We hope to start a similar adventure in 2015 but are still in early planning stages except we already have our vehicle. Thanks!
Hi Tracey!
Can’t wait to read about your adventures as well! For our truck and the two of us the ferry was just over $300USD. This increases pretty quickly as the rig size increases.
Thank you so much for the informative post, it really helped us organize ourselves for our trip of a couple of days ago. The only thing I would add is to ensure that you ask NOT to be put at the bow beside the very hot and noisy fans. That is where we were initially until I convinced them to move us out into the open like you were. Thanks again and bien viaje.
Thanks guys for informative post and most importantly map!
Hi Guys,
We’re from the Ottawa area and are going to be heading over to the Baja Peninsula this winter via the Mexican mainland. Wondering who you went with for car insurance in Mexico? Also, did you reserve/buy your ferry tickets in advance or day of?
Hi Natalie! We purchased our car insurance through Baja Bound online before we entered Mexico. We were able to buy our ferry tickets the same day of sailing, but we were told previously that they needed to be purchased ahead of time so it might be a good idea to buy ahead of time if you can. Have a great time in Baja
Thanks Rich and Ash – this is super helpful! I also have some questions for you guys about safety/security driving through Mexico – will send those questions via email 🙂
Hey there,
We are also an Ottawa family traveling by ferry to Baja with 2 young kids. We are already in Sayulita and heading over in Feb 2016. Appreciate any and all advice.
I just travelled with a girl friend and my motorcycle across, I was pleasently surprised with the journey overall, I even made a video documenting the whole experience while I was there:
https://youtu.be/MHCdpsn7pMM
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