Home Cruise ports Puerto Vallarta

Puerto Vallarta Cruise Port: What Can You Walk To?

Puerto Vallarta's cruise terminal is in the hotel zone, and the town everybody means — the cobbled Zona Romántica with the crown-topped church — is five kilometres south.

Can you walk it?: Partly walkable — partly — the pier is 5 km from the old town
Where ships dock: Terminal Marítima, about 5 km north of the Zona Romántica.
Pier to town: A cheap bus or taxi; walking it is possible but 5 km along a busy road.
Typical time ashore: Typically 8am–5pm.

Once you are there, it is one of the better walking towns in Mexico: a beachfront malecón lined with bronze sculptures, cobbled hill lanes, and a beach in the middle of the old town. The bus down the coast road costs about a dollar and takes twenty minutes, which is the single most useful thing to know here.

Build a Puerto Vallarta port-day route

Tell it how many hours you have ashore and it plans a route that fits — Puerto Vallarta is already filled in.

What to see on foot in Puerto Vallarta

The Malecón

A 1.5 km seafront promenade with a permanent collection of bronze sculptures, and sand sculptors working below it.

Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe

The crown on the tower is modelled on the one worn by the Empress Carlota. The original fell in a 1995 earthquake and was replaced with fibreglass.

Zona Romántica

Cobbled lanes climbing the hill south of the river, with the best food in the city.

Playa Los Muertos

The main town beach at the end of the Zona Romántica, with a pier — walkable from anywhere in the old town.

The Río Cuale island

A wooded islet in the middle of the river between the two halves of town, with a market and a small museum.

Planning the day

Bus or taxi to the Zona Romántica first, then walk north along the malecón to the church and back down through the Cuale island — about 4 km, all flat, with a beach at each end.

What to watch out for

Timeshare touts at the terminal are extremely persistent — say no and keep walking. The 5 km from the pier is along a busy highway and not a pleasant walk.

All-aboard is not the departure time. It is usually 30 to 60 minutes earlier, and a ship waits only for its own excursions. Plan any route to be back at the pier with an hour in hand.

Questions about the Puerto Vallarta port day

Can you walk from Puerto Vallarta cruise terminal to town?

It is about 5 km along a busy road, so most people take the local bus for around a dollar or a taxi. Once in the Zona Romántica, everything is walkable.

What is the Malecón in Puerto Vallarta?

A 1.5 km seafront promenade through the old town, lined with a permanent collection of bronze sculptures. It is the spine of any walking route here.

What is a self-guided walking tour?

A route you walk on your own schedule, with the commentary delivered to your phone instead of by a guide. There is no meeting point and no group — you start when you want, stop as long as you like at anything that interests you, and skip anything that does not.

How long are the tours?

You choose: 30 minutes, one hour, two hours, or three and more. The route is planned to fit the time, including how long you say you want to spend at each stop.

Does it work offline?

You need a connection to plan the tour and to stream the narration for each stop. Once a stop's audio has played it is cached by your browser, but plan for having data where you are walking.

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Plan your Puerto Vallarta route

A 24-hour pass is $6.95 and covers unlimited tours. Joining someone else’s is free.