zuccaandra

My family is thinking about visiting the Riviera Maya the week after Christmas. We are two adults and two small children (ages 5 and 6). We do not want to stay in a mega resort and have rented villas in other parts of the Caribbean in the past and really enjoyed it. In reading reviews of this area I have read of many burglaries, so I am wondering if it is safe to rent/stay offsite of a resort or hotel.
Also, where would be the best place/area to do this?
Finally, if the answer is no, can anyone recommend any smaller, quality hotels with character?
Thanks,
Catherine

zootsi

Where do you want to stay - Playa del Carmen, Tulum, Akumal, etc,etc? All of these areas have their own unique vibe. This part of Mexico is not as crime ridden as people are led to believe. Have you been to the locogringo.com website?

hopefulist

We spent a week of our vacation last summer in Tulum and chose to stay in town at Posada Luna del Sur:
http://sites.google.com/site/posadalunadelsur/welcome

It gets fabulous ratings on Trip Advisor and our experience there was wonderful.
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Rev...Peninsula.html

We liked being close to shopping, fruit stands, and restaurants and were happy to have ac since we were there in June and it was HOT (but we saved with low season rates) - with kids that might be nice even over Christmas; the places on the beach use generators and don't have elec. at night. A taxi to the beach, the ruins, etc. was just a few dollars each way.

You can see photos and read about our trip here (photo blog and detailed travelogue links on the main page of each collection):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/staceyholeman/collections

virginia

we rented a villa called casa cavu on tankah bay beach a couple years ago. good house with nice couple who ran the house from onsite casita. he will cook if requested (for fee of course) has nice pool. we (my bff/travel buddy & her 80 yr old mom) felt completely safe but the house did come with a night watchman - so we felt even safer. there were numerous other houses on tankah that we liked the look of. soliman bay just to the north has loads of good houses too.
we had a car so toured around quite a bit. akumal is a great area with tons of rental villas or condos.
friends recently stayed in a condo on jade beach and had a wonderful time.
decent snorkeling from each of these locations.
your kids might enjoy a day at: http://www.xelha.com/

locogringo is an outstanding travel site with info on villas & EVERYthing to see/do in the area
bill-in-tulsa.com has more rentals
another good site is http://www.mapchick.com/

scotchsd

The burglaries you are reading about are old news. Both Soliman Bay and Tankah III have had full time security for over 2 years now and there have not been any burglaries since.