Back in February 2024 we did something with our van I don’t think has ever been done before… We stuck it on a cargo ship in Lisbon and sent it 1500km across the Atlantic to the Azores islands.

It was genuinely one of the craziest things we’ve ever done.

The amount of paperwork. The regulations. The declarations. The sheer panic of not knowing if our van would make it there in one piece…

Was it worth it? We’ll let you decide.

The Azores are one of the most unique and beautiful places we’ve ever visited. They may be blowing up online recently and some of the most popular spots can get very touristy, but because so few tourists drive there, there’s a huge amount of wild island left to be explored.

Taking camper van to Azores Portugal 2024

This isn’t really a guide, because taking a camper van to the Azores is so prohibitively expensive and complicated it’s unlikely after reading this anyone would want to try.

But we had the unique opportunity to take our van there when working on series 3 of our documentary programme for NHK, and thought it would be interesting to share our experience.

Pre-Planning

Taking our van to the Azores would not have been possible without our Portuguese fixer who arranged everything on our behalf. It’s reasonably common for locals to import cars to the islands, but nobody ever takes their vehicle there on a trip. The officials spoken to were confused, suspicious or just incredulous- they couldn’t understand why we’d want to spend so much money on taking our crappy van (valued at £500) there for just two weeks, and were suspicious it might be carrying drugs.

The main complication was that there are no passenger ferries from Portugal to the Azores. Vehicles are carried as cargo and people fly. Each island has its own port and airport, but the majority of arrivals land at São Miguel island, our destination.

The second biggest complication was thanks to Brexit– as the U.K. is no longer part of the E.U., and because the van would be arriving as cargo and not a road-driven vehicle, it had to be temporarily imported into the E.U. for the duration of its stay. Thanks, Brexit.

The authorities also wanted multiple assurances that we would not in fact be leaving the van on the island, and we had to sign a declaration and make a deposit to guarantee that it would be leaving with us (I don’t blame them, LDVs aren’t very sought after in the U.K. either and the island doesn’t need a rusting scrapheap littering its shores).

Just some of the many documents that had to be filled out, signed, stamped and officiated were:

– Temporary E.U. importation
– Declaration of van’s value
– Declaration of shipping
– Customs clearance
– Customs power of attorney
– Proof of insurance

This was in addition to the actual arranging of the shipping via a cargo company.

Costs

The costs of shipping our van to the Azores were pretty high, considering we were only shipping it to a Portuguese island and not an entirely different continent. That said the van did travel halfway to America, 1400km into the Atlantic Ocean.

Meanwhile we had to fly separately from Lisbon to Ponta Delgada, which was comparatively cheap, although the cost of hotels either side while waiting for the van to arrive did quickly rack up. Hence why we prefer van travel– no accommodation costs!

€1600 outbound journey
€1600 inbound journey
€700 taxes
€2000 deposit
€324.90 flights
€880.77 hotels
26 cents port fee
= €7,105.93

Journeying

We dropped our van off at Terminal Santa Apolónia in Lisbon on an ominously wet and windy day and said goodbye. Handing over the keys was the scariest part as we never trust anyone with our van but there was no other option as it had to be driven on and searched by customs. The van had to wait at the port until the ship was ready to sail, which ended up taking around 2 days due to weather delays. We were fretting the whole time, partly due to the area around the port not looking particularly safe (although we were assured the port has 24 hour security) and the idea of our van travelling out on the open deck risking being damaged.

It turned out our fears were pretty valid, as the van arrived 3 days later (5 days after we left it) covered in salt from sailing on the open deck– although thankfully it was unscathed, it did slightly accelerate the rate at which it’s rusting.

Meanwhile we boarded a flight from Lisbon to Ponta Delgada early the next day and arrived after just 2½ hours (we even got a vegetarian meal consisting of a very small, very dry unbuttered sandwich with less jam than would’ve been rationed during the war).

We had 6 days to spend exploring the islands by chauffeur while we awaited the arrival of the van, which gave us an insight into what most tourists experience during their stays.

Side note: hotels in Ponta Delgada are not very peaceful, being directly under the flight path of the airport, although they do serve a tasty breakfast with pineapple jam.

We were reunited with our van on Valentine’s Day and collected her from the port, paying a princely 26 cent port handling fee for her release and showing our documents (insurance, drivers license) to the local police, who were very courteous and didn’t bother us once during our time on the island. We could immediately tell the locals apart from the tourists driving through town, as they baulked at the sight of a strange foreign van while the tourists walked by unaware. It certainly attracted some attention!

Our van arriving at the port at Ponta Delgada.

Exploring

São Miguel island is only 759km² which is the primary reason it’s not worth spending €7000+ to ship a camper van there. It’s also pretty much on its own in the far west of the Azores archipelago (apart from nearby Santa Maria) and there are no ferries that run from São Miguel to the other islands. Only the Linha Azul and Linha Verde run between Faial, Pico and São Jorge islands and carry a limited number of cars seasonally. So once you arrive with your van on São Miguel island, there’s nowhere else to go unless you park it and fly. Which kind of defeats the object.

We had just over a week with our van to explore, and we managed to drive almost every road on the island. Our favourite thing was being able to get really creative with our park-ups; there were no apparent wild camping restrictions and so much wilderness accessible via steep gravel tracks that even saw us driving over the rims of volcanoes and into their craters! (Of course we always park responsibly and consciously and never leave any trace behind).

The sky was so dark at night, darker than any other place we’ve seen. But the humidity was unbearable at a constant 80%, and opening the doors and windows for air only made the bedding damp, which was a challenge. The first two days were also so foggy we couldn’t see any sights!

We bathed in all of the hot springs (and wrote a guide on them too) which was our main reason for visiting, but as well as the stunning Sete Cidades crater and the fumaroles of Furnas we particularly enjoyed the wilder east side of São Miguel island where we drove to and camped on the island’s highest peak.

Return

After an incredible week it was time for us to return the van to the port at Ponta Delgada (where she’d become somewhat of a local celebrity by now), hand over the keys and fly back to Lisbon, where we rented an AirBnB while we waited. The van took no less than 8 days to arrive back in mainland Europe, taking a detour via Madeira without us (!). She arrived covered in salt again and with a few items missing, including an expensive tripod and a flashlight. Thankfully we’d taken all of our valuables on the flight with us.

The final thing to do was drive home to the U.K. and present a document to French customs to assure them our Loud Dirty Van had been removed from the European continent as promised, and our poor fixer could have his €2000 deposit returned.

Do you need a van to enjoy the Azores? Absolutely not. It was a unique opportunity for us and we really enjoyed having our van as a base to explore from, but being such small islands you could easily see most of them using a tour company or rental car. Motorhome hire is available on São Miguel too which is a lot cheaper and simpler than shipping your own van over!

We hope you’ve found this guide insightful, and if you still have any questions drop us a comment below.