bus from Ecuador to Peru

Thanks so much for this info. Its exactly what I wanted. This will be my first border crossing and I was wondering how I get a stamp if I get a direct bus.

hi, i am also wanting to take the bus from Ecuador to Peru this Sat. I arrive at the airport at 6am. I was looking on line to try and see if I could book the bus and get details but I wasn't able to find anything? Are you able to tell me if you booked on line and if so what site you went thru please? Thanks heaps.

Does anyone know about traveling via bicycle across the ecuador-peru border? is it safer to get on a bus? and if so is it reasonable to bring our bikes and trailers with us on the bus? ...ie. will we be able to watch our stuff?

Tried this in April, 2010. Arrived in Piura, Peru in morning. Tried to get a bus to Ecuador. Was told there was only one bus company (CIFA) that did the cross border trip, and that it left Piura in the evening (about 6 pm), traveling overnight only to arrive in Guayaquil the following morning (6 am). As I did not particularly like the city of Piura, I wanted to get out right away, but the bus schedule would have forced me to stay the day. I looked at the map, and found out that this bus actually traveled through Mancora (a small, mellow border town) along the way. Perfect. I chose to head to a different bus company and head to Mancora right away, spend the day there, then pick up this CIFA bus later that evening when it passed through on its way to Ecuador. And so, I caught the bus to Mancora, spent the day, and enjoyed my time there. At the CIFA office in Mancora, I bought my ticket through to Ecuador and was told that the bus would arrive about 8:30 pm. I arrived in time, hung around, but no bus. Finally, about an hour later (9:30 pm) the bus pulls up (really nice two decker bus). I go to give the driver my main pack to stow away under the bus, and he says pointedly to me "Whatever you do, watch your carry on luggage, take it with you everywhere, and don't let it out of your site". Sure, I know ... but he was really stressing this. I go to get on the bus, and it is completely ripped apart/destroyed, there is stuff everywhere, and most of the girls are crying and the guys are visibly stressed out. As I get on, I find out that the bus had just been hijacked by four masked men with guns. These men got on the bus at Piura, and rode to the countryside, when one went to the drivers "cockpit" area and made him pull over on the side of the highway, one gunman robbed everyone on the main floor of the bus, and the other two men robbed the top level of the bus of all their valuables and money. As I begin to question myself on why I was proceeding to get on this bus, I realized that this was perhaps (now) the safest bus I could be on. The bus had already been robbed, everyone was stressed to the limits and freaking out about everything, and anyone still interested in robbing the bus would now be gone. As the girls at the front seats of the top level of this bus were so stressed out over having been just held up at gunpoint, they couldn't stand having to look out the front window (now thinking that the bus was going to crash into something and/or end up driving off the road at every turn). I now had the perfect seat for which to view my trip into Ecuador. I had all my possessions and a safe trip into Ecuador. And I learned a lesson ... perhaps the best thing to do is to keep MOST of your valuables and/or money in your checked baggage, with a trust that the compartment is locked and the bus driver is not going to give it away. When you get on buses in this part of the world and ask why most bus companies video-tape your face upon departure, or force you to provide a fingerprint upon boarding, realize that it is in an attempt to prevent an ongoing problem of robbery at night, and more specifically what happened to the bus I was otherwise supposed to be on (early bus from Piura, Peru). After being on the road for 3 months at this point, I had a gut feeling about Piura that I did not like. Mancora, on the other hand, was truly awesome. That too, was a gut feeling. Or maybe I had a horseshoe stuck up my ass. So for anyone wishing to do this trip, good luck, and be sure to keep a tight arse.

There is a new website in Peru to find your bus tickets and compare prices and schedules [www.busportal.pe] .
It just came out, it is in spanish/french and english. Additionally, it has safe companies you can find in Peru: Cruz del Sur, Tepsa, Linea...
Good luck:)

Edited by: KarolRiboud

Hi there,
I travelled in Dec 2012 across that border without any problems as there is a new border building right between Ecuador and Peru. The bus only needs to stop there, you get out, go to the Ecuadorian desk, then one meter further to the Peruvian desk for immigration and you are done.all busses wait for the passengers.actually it was one of the easiest and quickest border crossings in the whole of Latin America, even easier than going from Canada to the US.
Happy travels!

Hi , am going to Peru /Ecuador in August, could you tell me where exactly you crossed the border and what company you used? you said it was a new crossing?
thanks!!

My name is Brian Tyhy and I was abducted while traveling from Mancora Peru to Ecuador. It happy this last March and it was very upsetting and could have ended very badly. I had purchased a bus ticket with Cifa bus company but the lady at the bus office in Mancora told me I would take a mini van to Tumbles and transfer. We arrived in Tumbles and the mini bus driver dropped me at the corner and refused to drive me to the Cifa Terminal. A mini tuku driver spoke english and said he worked for Cifa bus company and would take me to the terminal. He then drove to a plaza and told me the bus would pick me up in the Plaza. We waited and after 1/2 hour he received a phone call and told me the bus had left without me. He made some more phone calls and told me someone from the bus company would drive me to the border to meet the bus. This person arrived and I got in their car with him. That is when the problems really started to happen. After 10 minutes in the car, they started asking how much money I had and told me there was problems at the border. They wanted to see my money and to make a long store short, after some yelling and swearing my me and lots of intimidating I was dropped at the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. At this point we had been in the car for about 45 minutes. At the same time they dropped me beside the road, a taxis drove up and after some confrontation with the original drivers, I got in the taxis thinking I had finally got rid of my problems. I had paid them 40 dollars to rid of them because they won't leave without some money.

That was the beginning of another problem. The taxis driver had been phoned by these two idiots or should I said these criminals and he was just as bad as the original criminals. I got in the taxis and we drove about 5 minutes and got to the border but he refused to stop. The border is enclosed by a concrete fence and certain taxis can drive right around the border fence without stopping. This has created a scenario where corrupt taxis drivers/criminals can take
advantage. I kept asking the taxis driver to stop but he refused and I was really worried he had plans for an express kidnapping. After about 45 minutes there was a military check point and I jumped out of the taxis. I should have gone to the military and reported this taxis driver but I was in the country illegally I was traumatized and confused.

I don't know if the CIFA office in Mancora was behind this but don't take the CIFA bus from Mancora. This happened in the middle of march 2014.

Well Brian if you had read the numerous posts about which bus lines to travel with you wouldn't have had this trouble but as a first time traveller with this thread an indeed all of thorn tree I doubt whether you are genuine or a troublemaker of some sort....Canadians are usually not this cynical or slack about proof of posting as you are.... Are you as troll of some sort as I suspect? And why were you in the country illegally?

he was technically illegal because he hadn't stopped at the border for passport stamp because the taxi wouldn't stop--not because he was sneaking in. the driver in this scam counts on the tourist fearing deportation or jail or something , and so they won't report anything.