Tikal
 

Hi, guys! Did anyone use a good tour company to go to Tikal that they would recommend? I'm learning that you can save some $ by booking the tours directly rather than going through the hotels. Would love your recommendations and a description of the tour you did. It sounds like Tikal is worth the trip. We're not interested in spending the night there, just a day trip. Thanks for all your wonderful help!

We did it as a day trip from Chaa Creek, which was fine for what it was, but I think you're making a mistake not spending the night. In addition to avoiding the crowds and heat of mid-day, you'll have a better opportunity to observe wildlife. We intend to return to do just that.

I agree with Fra - sorry if that's not what you wanted to hear! Half the amazingness (that's a word, right?) of Tikal is the jungle setting. It's just incredible to be able to explore in the cooler evening and early morning hours when the wildlife is active and you practically have the place to yourselves. Day trip means 2-3 hours each way in a car and about 3 hours during the scorchy time of day when all the day trippers from Belize and Guatemala City/Antigua are there.

I've visited 3 times and always spent a night in the park so can't help with day trip operators. For a really excellent guide (read: phenomenal), you could try to contact Roxy Ortiz at the Tikal Inn which her brothers manage. She's an archaeologist who guides at Tikal when she's not away on a dig and she's really knowledgeable about the flora and fauna as well as the history and architecture. She's also just really great to hang out with. She typically does the early morning tours but you might get lucky if you plan in advance.

Happy trails!

I disagree totally; we got an early start from San Ignacio, and had a full day at the ruins, and saw a huge amount (climbed structures, saw/heard howlers). It's only 2 hours from San Ignacio (and 1.5 hours from the Belize/Guatemala border). I am an archaeology geek, especially all things Mayan, and had more than enough time at Tikal in a day trip. Can't think of anything I missed (tho of course I'd go back in a minute). GO AHEAD AND DO A DAY TRIP, you won't regret it at all. There's plenty of jungle to visit elsewhere; you want to see the great structures, and you will. There are a few tour group offices next to the PAK-Z guys in San Ignacio; they have good tours and reasonable rates. I would not recommend the taxi--border--taxi in Guatemala route; get a tour that leaves from Belize, by people who know all the ropes.

BTW, Mayatours and Pacz both do the entire trip (and pick up from your hotel, I think), with lunch, fees, everything all included, for ~$130 p/p; but you can yet a better rate if you arrange it in person.

sylvia - I wasn't saying it wasn't worth doing as a day trip if that's all the time someone has to invest. The taxi-border-taxi was a piece of cake for us and saved us a bundle since we were traveling as a family of 5. That said, when we hired the driver to come back and get us the next day, we were nervous he might not show; we needn't have worried, though.

I hope some day you get to go back and stay in the park so you'll see it that way, too - I think you'd become a convert.

I agree with sylvia - although it would be great to do an overnight at Tikal. If you only have 4 days at Chaa Creek and then are moving on to one of the Cayes, spending an overnight at Tikal cuts into your time too much. I love the Mayan ruins. I find them fascinating and thought Tikal was absolutely amazing. I'd go back in a second, but also felt that a day trip was enough as well. It wasn't too long for a day trip and we saw so much and never felt rushed.

If we had more time, maybe we'd do an overnight - but I don't think it's necessary to enjoy the park.

I agree that if you don't have the time, a day trip is fine. Just going by my own experience, I'd like to have spent more time in the park.

From the OP:
"We're not interested in spending the night there, just a day trip."
It seemed as tho she was being scolded for not doing it the way others wanted her to, even though she knew the responses when she posted! I was reassuring OP that a day trip was a wonderful thing to do. We'd all like to do some things differently, but that is not always possible. So, it's not a "mistake" to not spend the night, just a different experience.
All of which reminds me, Fra, I need to buy a lottery ticket today!

Yeah - I guess I came on kind of strong given the OP's question, sorry about that, vg. Without a doubt, our dawn visit to Tikal in 2003 is my most incredible travel memory and the highlight of our life together as a family, absolutely magical. That's why I advise others to go for it when the topic comes up.

Thanks, guys - hopeful, when I posted, I told my husband that you were going to post and say we should spend the night - lol! You did not let me down! I know you're passionate about it. Like Shell said, our time is really limited so a day trip is good for us at this point. Glad everyone thinks it is still worth it. We've hiked ruins in Mexico and seen a lot of wildlife in CR, but I'm still very excited about Tikal. I do think we'll be going back again someday. Sylvia, thanks for the names; I will check them out.

Afterward, we wished we had had time to overnight in Tikal--it was amazing. But we only had 7 nights, and we felt it best to do it as a daytrip. I'd like to do it again differently, but the daytrip was awesome.

We used Pacz, booked through the hotel, for Tikal and ATM. We realized later that we could have booked them ourselves for less $$, but it was just so convenient to do it through the hotel. You know?

So true - C.C. is charging $338 for the ATM tour if I'm reading it right, but Pacz told me they would only charge us $90 per person - it looks like a huge savings to book things on your own.

We paid $70 each for the Pacz ATM tour; they might have given us a discount because there were 7 of us, though. I just checked out their website and it says $80:
http://www.pacztours.net/pages/tours/ATM.html

If you don't book directly (in person, or even by phone when you get there is the best), the middleman is for sure taking a big piece of your price.

I just contacted Pacz tours directly via email and Bob Jones, the office manager, is the person who responded every time.

I just went to the above-posted website and got $135 pp US for the daytrip to Tikal from Pacz. I suspect there are cheaper tour providers (from the row of offices next to Pacz in San Ig.) for Tikal; but they are a good, licensed outfit for ATM (they only allow a few tour groups to go to ATM; you could probably get the price down on a day when they didn't have anyone else lined up, but better to be sure?)

Pacz seems to get consistently good reviews. Do you have to bring your passport when you go to Tikal? Do you go through some sort of immigration at the border?

You go through immigration at the border so you do need your passport. You get the Guatamala stamp. Then after walking across, our tour guide stood in another line and did something else while we waited. I don't know what that was about. I can't remember if he had our passports or not, I sort of think he did.

If the Pacz guides for Tikal are anywhere as good as the one we had for ATM, you can't go wrong with them!

The variances in price ($70-$90) may also be due to where they have to pick you up.

We had Pacz pick us up in Santa Elena at the Aguada where we were staying. There are 2 places to stop at the border - out of Belize and into Guatemala and passports are needed both places. Guides can sometimes wait in a different line or sneak through to the back. I was a little disconcerted when our driver heading from Flores to Belize City took our passports and headed through the door past the lines and desks but he resurfaced after 5 minutes with everything in order; he had us waiting in a long line just in case and it barely budged during the time he was away - saved us a half hour or more.

volcanogirl, we didn't pay anything close to that with CC booking our ATM tour. It was more like $100-$120 pp. I meant that we could have saved a few dollars booking ourselves, not hundreds! That just CAN'T be right! If so, what a rip off!

http://www.chaacreek.com/rates/thespa-copy-copy-copy/ is the price list that they gave me - am I reading it right?

Looks like $308 per group of one to four, thus $154 pp for a couple, $77 pp is you can find another couple.

Sorry, that is "IF you can find another couple."

Plus $30 in entry fees as well if I'm reading it right.

Those prices are why the package deal that included the tours worked out much better in our favor. Including the meals and tours saved us hundreds of dollars in the long run. Even had we booked our tours directly with the tour companies - just the fact that their package included the airport transfers, taxes, 2 full day tours a half day tour and all meals saved us a lot of money. We found quite a few people not going on any tours because they couldn't find other couple to share in the cost with them - seeing the prices were for 1-4 people - if they could have found 2 other people for the same tour for the same day they would have saved a lot of money. But several people had packages so it didn't work out for the people without the packages. Also going with a package in Ambergris, the price of the transfer to Ambergris (the flights and tranfers there) was included as well, we just didn't get one where all meals were included. We got one where breakfast, one dinner and a couple of excursions were included, as well as the transfers.

I found the pricing to be tricky, but in the long run -for us the packages saved on the tours.

Shell, are the dinners there communal? Or how do people go about finding out if other people want to tour with them?

No you eat at your own table. It's not like BDC. But the pool is pretty much the social gathering place from what we found. We went to the pool every afternoon after coming back from our tours - until we went to dinner. There were always people hanging out there. And on the days we didn't go anywhere, or if we did the half day tours we were at the pool relaxing and there were people there in the morning as well. That's seemed to be where people would talk. It was never crowded though.

People kept to themselves at dinner, other than a friendly "hi"!

The bar area was fairly quiet for the most part it seemed, except right before dinner one or two of the nights we were there. It defitely was not a late night place.

Thanks, everyone. I appreciate all the help.