Passport Pages for Central America
 

I am in the initial planning stages to ride from Canada to Panama. Checking my passport I see I have 6 blank pages and 6 partial pages available for stamps. Would this be enough for all 9 countries or do a lot of countries take an entire page?

It depends on whether or not you need a visa to enter a country. You can find the answer to that question on the government web page of the country that you are a citizen of.

Visas are normally applied in the form of a sticker that takes up a whole page, so you will need to reserve a page for each country that you need to get a visa for.

Otherwise, if you don't need a visa, partially blank pages are sufficient to handle entry & exit stamps.

You might want to consider putting a Post-It note or similar on your blank pages, so that border officials don't put a stamp there and thus eliminate that page for use as a visa location.

Michael

PS: Of greater importance, make sure that you have at least 6 months validity remaining on the passport, counting from the date you plan to re-enter Canada at the end of the trip. If you need to get a new passport, consider getting a 48 page 'Business' passport. It's cheaper to get the 48 page one than it is to get two sequential 24 page ones.

Since you're planning to bring your own vehicle, I'd be tempted to get a new passport. When a vehicle is entered separately, everything takes more space--for example, last couple of times I was in Guatemala I got an entry stamp for myself, another for my motorbike, then an exit for myself and again another for my bike. That's a full page. Honduras took a full page for entry and another for exit. I can't read all the faded stamps to see what's what for other Central American countries, but it's also likely that you'll enter and exit at least a few countries more than once. For example, how are you getting back to Canada?

There's something very satisfying about filling all the empty spaces on a passport. I've got one in which I did exactly that, 44 pages start to finish including the endorsement pages at the end. There's a definite compulsive quality about this, at least in my case.

Or you could play the odds and trust your luck. Most countries will fill in partial pages if asked, and as Michael suggests above it's well worth blocking off full pages for when they're really needed. Otherwise you end up with a single stamp right in the middle of an otherwise empty page, just because some bureaucrat likes to admire his (faded, almost ink-free) stamp.

With Six pages and six parts left blank you have enough space. Just ask them to be sensible and apply the stamps in an orderly way. Fill every space.
The US customs guys are often sloppy if yo present a passport with many blank pages they have a knack for going to a random page and slapping a stamp right in the middle. MEXICAN stamps are small and most Central American stamps can fit a pair of countries on one page .
As you return north the CA countries will often just add an over stamp on the previous as a proof that you are departed from the country .

Check with your government.
 

I would agree with Markharf and get a new passport.

The Chinese and Russians are the most diligent at stamping entry and exit stamps beside each other. It makes it easy to see if you have overstayed and also makes it easy for them to count the days you have been in their country if need be.
See if you can get a new passport or if your country allows you to have an additional passport, some countries permit this. This is useful as you may have to send your passport off to an Embassy, Visa Office or Consulate for a visa and you maybe in a country that requires foreigners to carry passports. Check with your government web pages to be accurate and don't rely on well meaning chat on an internet forum. Also beware of scammers online who are in the business of getting money from innocents re visa scams.

If possible apply in your home country for visas in advance rather than overseas. Though I know this isn't always possible and can create time pressures...
Be organised when going through a border and I only answer questions that I am asked, I don't offer any more information than I have to.
Kind regards
James