Resources for Your RV Trip in Mexico
This post is dedicated to specific and helpful resources that you can use when planning an RV trip or road trip through Baja or Mainland Mexico. Route planning for first-time RVers through Mexico is actually pretty straightforward. If you’re looking for route planning information, we have two really useful guides: Baja Road Trip Itinerary and Mainland Mexico Road Trip Itinerary.
Quick note, the guide below assumes that you have access to the Telcel network – the main cell service provider throughout Baja and Mexico. Our Verizon service includes access to the Telcel towers, so we were able to access the internet. You’ll definitely want to check with your service provider on this ahead of time.
RV Camping Now vs 1992
If you’ve looked into this a bit already, you probably saw a ton of advice [from 10+ years ago] to get the Churches ‘RVing in Mexico’ books. Unless you can find them for $20 or under, DO NOT get the Churches RVing in Mexico Books!
Terri and Mike Church wrote camping guides to Baja and Mexico in the 1990s. I’m sure that they were very useful back then but 1) a LOT has opened/closed/changed since the Churches stopped updating their guides and 2) since they’re no longer in print, people are trying to resell these out-dated guides to desperate people for $250. That’s a no from us.
What was going on in the 90s? Boy bands were only just gaining traction, the Cold War was coming to a close and importantly, we did not have tiny computers with access to the world’s knowledge in our pockets 100% of the time. It’s different now.
As far as camping goes, you can easily get all that same information, but recently updated, by using a handful of apps and a couple facebook groups. FYI we have a handy list of RVing and Vanlifing Resources already, but on this page we’ll get more specific to Mexico.
Baja vs Mexico
But first, where are you going?
It may not be obvious from the outside, but Baja and Mexico are completely separate places when it comes to RVing and road tripping. Driving customs, camping strategy, access to amenities, even the resources you use will be different from one to the other.
It might surprise you to hear that even Mexicans don’t really consider Baja to be relevant to Mexico – they think of it as just a literal and figurative desert. They joke that it’s an extension of California USA and they’re only half kidding as there are a lot of tourists in Baja. But the tourism infrastructure makes it a wonderful intro to journeying in Mexico!
On that note, if you’re planning a trip to Baja, you are not going to get much help in any Mexico forums. This guide is separated according to the two different approaches you’ll take in Baja vs Mainland Mexico. Let’s start with Baja:
Baja Road Trip & RV Resources
The trek through Baja is much more sparse so you’re more likely to have spotty cell service. Yes, a lot of restaurants have wifi for guests, but we also recommend getting the Baja California Road & Recreation Atlas. Besides helping out with driving, it includes a list of recreation sites and campgrounds! You can get this Baja Road Atlas from REI and no, that in not an affiliate link.
FYI, as far as we know, there’s no similar atlas for mainland Mexico.
Google Offline Maps is one of your most powerful resources for when you’re in the middle of nowhere and need directions. Much of Baja has minimal cell service so downloading the whole peninsula ahead of time is a huge help. You can get all of Baja in 2 offline map frames, 3 max. We talk a lot more about Google Maps as an invaluable resource for RVing – for Mexico, US and Canada – in our Road Trip Resources Guide.
If you do not speak fluent Spanish, you may find it useful to have a translate app WITH the English > Spanish dictionary pre-downloaded on your phone. We use the Google Translate app and I was able to conduct an entire dental appointment with this one app.
It’s not remotely necessary for your travels, but WhatsApp is a great tool if you plan to connect and keep in touch with other travelers. Because so many RVers in Baja are Canadian and European, they can’t receive text messages reliably or without cost. WhatsApp is the universal solution.
We’ve found Facebook groups to be an excellent resource for local news, current conditions and suggestions for points of interest. In particular, Talk Baja is a great group specific to expats and travelers in the Baja Peninsula.
Camping Resources for Baja
So much of Baja is all about the beachside freecamping. If you’re used to freecamping or boondocking in the US, then you probably have a lot of the apps we mention here. However, not all of them work as well in Baja.
iOverlander – this is the one! iOverlander is the absolute best app for finding freecamping and established camping in Baja. In our experience this is the only app you need and it captures the data of most other resources out there.
You may have a few more camping apps already but they aren’t super helpful in Baja. Campendium, Free Roam and Harvest Host each have a small number of listings in Baja only and they’re mostly near the border and are often untested.
Another great resource is the RV Boondocking facebook group which doesn’t touch on Mainland Mexico but includes many posts about freecamping in Baja.
Mexico Road Trip and RV Resources
Lucky for you Mainland Mexico makes Baja look like a dusty ghost town. Your trip through ‘real’ Mexico includes a huge increase in amenities, restaurants, gas stations and, critically, cell service (if your provider connects to Telcel).
As noted above, we’ve had no luck finding a helpful Mexico road atlas. The good news is that Google Mapping your way through Mexico is much easier than in Baja. We still recommend downloading Google Offline Maps of your first couple of legs through the northern states where you’re more likely to experience service blips.
A major difference between RVing in Mexico vs Baja that you may have noticed is the number of route options. Baja has mainly one road through the peninsula whereas Mexico has infinite combinations of possible routes. For this reason, it’s more important to stay apprised of road conditions, current events and real-time traveler advice in mainland.
As mentioned above, Facebook groups are an incredible resource for driving your RV through Mexico. Expats in Mexico is mostly useful for information about living and traveling in Mexico. On the Road in México is a good reference for driving routes and road conditions.
RV’ing in Mexico and RV Mexico are the best groups for road tripping and RV travel. Note: the latter is affiliated with an RV caravan group. However you don’t have to be a customer to benefit from the wealth of knowledge. There’s some overlap in the discussion topics between the four facebook groups but they’re all great.
The recommendations we mentioned above to have a translation app and WhatsApp apply equally in Mainland Mexico.
Camping Resources for Mainland Mexico
Whereas in Baja you’re mostly beachside freecamping, your Mainland Mexico trip will rely much more on established campgrounds. These campgrounds are privately owned, with varying degrees and reliability of hookups.
The best resource for finding camping in Mainland Mexico is, again, iOverlander. We found almost all of our campsites on this one app with all 3 campground options turned on. Here you’ll find the most up-to-date info on current amenities, pricing and open status.
More Resources – Mexico & Baja
Bonus iOverlander Tips
If you can’t tell, iOverlander is an excellent resource for RV and road trip related info throughout Mexico and Baja. We traveled with these extras toggled on: Customs and Immigration, Checkpoint, and Warning. These will give you the location of toll booths or any official or unofficial, military or other roadblocks.
Also, you cannot drink water out of a hose on your trip. Using the “water” toggle on iOverlander was super helpful to us for finding water purification centers. Water is cheap in Mexico and you should definitely buy it purified or use a heavy-duty filter like a Berkey.
Review Sites & Finding Local Businesses
We talked about this a lot in our Guide to Food Safety and Choosing Restaurants in Mexico. In the olden days we used Yelp and maybe Tip Advisor while abroad. But in our experience, searching Google Maps is better for finding reviews of restaurants, hotels, etc.
If you’re looking for say, the best food experiences in Oaxaca, our recommendation is to hit the blogosphere. There are many excellent compilations of the best of the best. We have a whole Food Guide to Oaxaca, by the way.
Make Friends and Explore!
Still one of our most valuable resources for RV road tripping in Baja, Mexico, and everywhere, is chatting with other travelers. We get our best tips by simply asking fellow campers where their favorite places are. For example: where they like to camp in places like La Paz, or Oaxaca.
Happy travels and I hope these resources help you on your RV trip through Mexico!
2 comments
Very professional! Now I need a camper!
Yes you do!
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