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Reference

Every ferry that takes a campervan off the island

Crossings to Ireland and mainland Europe, with times and sailings, from the van's side. Free to read, free to link to.

Timetables checked August 2026

26crossings31ports6corridors

The crossings

Select a crossing to find it on the map, see the detail and open its guide.Select a crossing to see the detail and open its guide.

26 crossingsfastest 1 h 30 · longest 36 h

Order crossings

Short straits#

1 h 30 – 2 h · 2 routes

Western Channel#

4 h – 10 h 45 · 7 routes

Across Biscay#

20 h 30 – 36 h · 3 routes

North Sea#

7 h 15 – 15 h 45 · 3 routes

Irish Sea#

2 h – 8 h · 6 routes

Ireland to the Continent direct#

14 h – 31 h · 5 routes

Typical crossing times and sailing frequencies, checked against operator timetables in August 2026. Departure times are not listed here because they move with the season, so treat every figure as a guide and confirm with the operator before you book. This page is kept by the person who builds Quiet Route, and goes through the timetables again before each season.

Start from the destination

Where are you heading?

Brittany and the French west coast

Sail the Western Channel to Roscoff or St Malo and arrive with the holiday started. From Ireland, Cork to Roscoff does the same job.

Normandy

Caen, Cherbourg or Dieppe on the Western Channel. The beaches are an hour from the ramp.

Paris and the north of France

The short straits. Cheapest, most frequent, and the A16 points the right way.

The Alps and the south of France

It's a long drive whichever boat you take. The short straits win on fare; a Western Channel night boat wins on miles.

Spain and Portugal

The Biscay boats to Santander or Bilbao, or Plymouth's 20-hour sailing. Portugal is a day's drive beyond.

Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany

The North Sea boats land you on the Dutch motorways; Dunkirk on the short straits is the budget route to Belgium.

Ireland

Four corridors across the Irish Sea, spread from Cairnryan to Pembroke Dock. Holyhead to Dublin is the main road.

Scandinavia

No direct sailing takes a van from the UK. Newcastle to IJmuiden, then the drive north through Germany and Denmark.

Choosing your crossing

Five decisions that pick the route for you

Where to cross

A cheap fare can cost you a day's driving.

Dover to Calais is the cheapest and most frequent way across, and the easiest with a tall van. It also lands you the best part of a day's driving from the west of France.

The Western Channel boats cost more and sail less often, but Normandy and Brittany start at the ramp. Add the French tolls to the Calais fare before you compare the two.

The tunnel

The tunnel is quicker by hours, unless the van runs on LPG.

LeShuttle takes campervans up to 4.2 m tall, thirty five minutes platform to platform, and you stay in the van. The gas allowance is more generous than most boats, and it's worth reading carefully: no single cylinder over 47 kg, and 50 kg across the vehicle where you carry more than one. A fixed LPG habitation tank is accepted up to 80 per cent full. Valves off for the crossing.

The one hard rule is propulsion. Vehicles that run on LPG aren't carried at all. LeShuttle publishes no separate wording for a dual-fuel van, so if yours runs on gas in any part, ask before you book. If that isn't your van, price the tunnel against Dover, because it's often close.

Biscay

The drive down isn't as cheap as it looks.

Calais to Bilbao is roughly 1,200 km of motorway each way. The Biscay boats trade that for 20 to 33 hours at sea, and the fare looks steep until the road is costed honestly. Both columns below are one way, for one van.

The drive downCalais to Bilbao, one way

Dover to Calaisthe crossing the drive still needs£100
Fuelapprox. 1,200 km at 25 MPG, French diesel£250
Tollsthe péage route; taller vans pay more£130
A night on a sitebroken roughly halfway£25
Estimated total~£505

Plus a day and a half of travelling, each way.

The Biscay boatPortsmouth to Bilbao, one way

Van fareunder 7 m band, high season£510
Cabintwo berths, compulsory on Biscay£190
Estimated total~£700

Plus two nights at sea, asleep.

A worked example at August 2026 prices. Both columns move with season, van size and how you drive. The point is the shape, not the pennies.

The boat costs more in cash. One way, it hands back a day and a half of travelling, a night on a site and 1,200 km of van wear, and it doubles on a return trip. If the road through France is part of your trip, drive it. If it's just distance, count everything the road really costs first.

Ireland direct

The land bridge is only cheaper on paper.

A short crossing to Wales, the drive to Dover, then a second boat is often the cheaper fare. It costs you UK fuel, a long driving day and two sets of port queues.

The direct boats from Dublin, Rosslare and Cork take 14 to 24 hours and land you in France with no UK transit at all. One night in a cabin against a day and a half of motorway is a closer call than the fares suggest. For Spain, Rosslare sails to Bilbao twice a week, which saves driving the length of France on top of everything else.

Overnight

A night boat sells you a day back.

A day crossing is cheaper but spends a travel day. A night crossing costs a cabin and hands the day back: you drive off at breakfast where you wanted to be.

Price the cabin against a night on a site plus the day you'd have lost. On the longer routes it's closer than it looks.

After the ramp

Where the boats land you

Short straits

Calais and Dunkirk put you on the A16 with everything north of Paris in reach. The Opal Coast starts twenty minutes from the ramp; Bruges is ninety.

Western Channel

Cherbourg and St Malo land you with the Cotentin and the Brittany coast on arrival. The first aire can be twenty minutes from the port. The Caen boat docks at Ouistreham, on Sword Beach itself.

Biscay

Santander and Bilbao sit under the Picos de Europa, the mountains an hour and a half from Santander, just over two from Bilbao. The Cantabrian coast starts at the ramp.

North Sea

Hook of Holland and IJmuiden are on the motorway network within minutes. Amsterdam inside the hour, the German border inside two.

Irish Sea

Dublin and Belfast are city ports; Larne lands you at the foot of the Antrim coast road. Rosslare is the quiet one, with Waterford under an hour away.

Ireland to France direct

Cherbourg and Roscoff again, approached from the west: Brittany and Normandy on arrival, and the whole of France behind them.

The money

What a ferry fare is made of

Ferry pricing looks opaque until you see the parts. The vehicle band does most of the work, and everything else stacks on top of it.

The band price moves most with season and with height, which is why measuring the van honestly and booking the band early is most of the game. Cabins, pets and flexible tickets are add-ons; they change the total, not the shape.

Portsmouth to Caen6.5 m van, two adults, August day boat

Vehicle and driverthe height and length band£250
Second adulteach way£30
Reserved seatoptional on day boats£12
Estimated total~£292

One way, August, before add-ons. Double it for the return.

Figures are illustrative and move with season, operator and van size.

Questions

Ferry questions, from the van's side.

No. Vehicle decks are closed at sea on every route. Day crossings you travel in the lounges; overnight crossings mean booked accommodation, usually a cabin. The Brittany Ferries and Irish Ferries boats out of Ireland will take a reserved seat instead, and Rosslare to Dunkirk puts a cabin in the fare whether you want one or not.

By height and length band. Measure with everything fitted: a roof box or bikes can push you into the next band, and the gap between bands is real money.

You park where the crew put you, close the gas valves, kill the alarm, leave the van in gear and go up. There's no returning to the deck at sea, so take what you need for the crossing with you.

Valves closed, cylinders capped and declared at check-in. Brittany Ferries, for example, allows up to three bottles totalling 47 kg. The rules can differ by operator, so check yours.

On most routes, yes. Longer crossings have pet cabins or kennels, only a handful per sailing, so book those first. Some short routes let pets stay in the vehicle. Every operator does it differently.

The usual: passports, an animal health certificate if a pet travels, and insurance that covers the countries you land in. For France, order the Crit'Air sticker early from the official French site. The post takes weeks in summer, though the emailed certificate covers you while it ships.

The short straits are genuinely turn-up-and-go outside peak weekends. The Western Channel and Biscay boats sell out of van height bands in summer, so book those early.

The cabin is usually required and sometimes included. Weigh it against a night's site fee and the driving day you get back, not against the day fare alone.

Constantly: by season, by operator, by year. That's why every figure here is a guide. Check the operator before you plan around a sailing.

Elsewhere

Plan the driving either side

How this is kept

A note stands as written. A reference has to keep up.

  • Checked before each season

    Every route, crossing time and sailing frequency goes back through the operators' own timetables, and the date on the page moves only when that has actually happened.

  • Corrected in the open

    When a figure is wrong it gets fixed on the page rather than quietly dropped. A route with a closing date keeps its row and carries the date; it comes off the map when it actually stops running, not when the closure is announced.

  • Free to reproduce

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