Trip report: Playa del Carmen
Feb 23rd, 2008, 12:11 PM
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Trip report: Playa del Carmen
Hello,
Trip details: Two females in their early thirties from the Boston area on a much needed winter vacation (we both work in middle school, need I say more). We were in Playa from Feb. 17 to Feb. 22, about six days. Hopefully this will not be too long-winded...
Location: Hotel Riviera Caribe Maya in Playa del Carmen (on 5th Avenue), standard room, $75 per night
Pros of the hotel: Good location, on the quieter end of 5th Avenue, the service was wonderful. Small but adequate pool, room was clean with a TV and fridge.
Cons: Even though we were away from most of the 5th Avenue pedestrian and bar traffic, there was a lot of construction going on that was loud at times and 6th Avenue car traffic was heavy even during the night. However, with the a/c and ceiling fan on, it wasn't too much of a big deal. Also, the beds were very hard and uncomfortable (like as in sleeping on a box spring instead of a mattress!).
The hotel offers a discount at Mamitas Beach Club. However, we often had difficulty finding chairs with umbrellas (a necessity for our Yankee white skin!!), so we spent several days at the beach club next to Mamitas, the Kool Beach Club. We paid $14 USD a day to rent comfy chairs with a large umbrella, access to the pool and bathrooms, and beachside services for drinks and food. Pina coladas were about $5.00 each and a huge plate of chicken nachos was about $9.00. You could also get beach massages, and other water activies.
Other activities that we did: the front desk at our hotel set us up with a cab driver who took us to Akumal (Yal Ke Lagoon) for snorkeling than to the ruins at Tulum.
We really enjoyed this trip, but there were two things IMHO that were not so great. We decided to go to Yal Ke Lagoon to snorkel first thing in the AM to avoid the crowds we had read about. It is easy to enter the water and there are showers to rinse off in and bathrooms. P.S. you are not allowed to have on suntan lotion unless you can show them that it is biodegradable. I think it was about $5.00 to get in (?) per person.
However, the visibility was very poor and it was pretty shocking to see the number of people who touched or stood on the coral. We were able to see some fish, and my friend was just learning how to snorkel so it was ok for us, but for myself, having snorkeled in many areas in the Caribbean, it was pretty disappointing. As we were leaving, there were also many tour groups just arriving (around 10:00AM). Unfortunately time did not allow us to snorkel in Akumal Bay or Half Moon Bay, which I suspect might have been significantly better.
We then proceeded to the ruins at Tulum, which were beautiful. We opted not to get a guide and walk around ourselves. You are able to walk down to the beach and swim if you like. Here was the second "not-so-great thing": the crowds!!! Oh my gosh, I guess we should have known there would be a lot of people, but there were easily hundreds of people, which made it difficult to get around. I would recommend to try and get to the ruins as early in the AM as possible, before all the tour groups show up.
On the way back, we had a lovely lunch at Ana Y Jose's Hotel in Tulum, what a gorgeous beach and great salads.
Restaurants in Playa that we enjoyed (P.S. service at every restaurant was just great, everyone was so friendly and good to us):
Playasia (in the Blue Parrot Hotel)--a little pricey, but excellent suschi
La Palapa Hemingway (5th Avenue)--we had drinks here several times--good tables for people watching on 5th Avenue, and the homemade guacamole that they make right at your table is great.
La Vagabonda (5th Avenue)--we ate breakfast here one morning, good portions. They also service lunch and dinner.
There was an Italian restaurant across from the Glass Bar on 5th Avenue, something with the name Bruno in it, that was also excellent.
We also had drinks at Fusion, which has small tables right on the beach and good size drinks, and at Om (excellent chocolate martini!!). On our last evening, we went dancing at Coco Palm (located next to the Blue Parrot), and at the Blue Parrot.
Well, I think this covers most of our six day trip. Flights going down were on time and uneventful. Not so on the way home--we just got back last night after 12 hours of misery getting from Cancun to Charlotte (two hour delay because of snow storms on the east coast), missing out connection, then Charlotte to Boston, on US Air two hours after our original flight left. We made two landing attempts in Boston because the first time there was "something on the runway", as the pilot put it, and they had to jerk the plane up at the last minute. Fortunately, despite the snow, we landed safely.
But it is very, very difficult to go from 82 degrees to 30!!!! We would definitely return to Playa. Hope this trip report is helpful!!
Melissa
Trip details: Two females in their early thirties from the Boston area on a much needed winter vacation (we both work in middle school, need I say more). We were in Playa from Feb. 17 to Feb. 22, about six days. Hopefully this will not be too long-winded...
Location: Hotel Riviera Caribe Maya in Playa del Carmen (on 5th Avenue), standard room, $75 per night
Pros of the hotel: Good location, on the quieter end of 5th Avenue, the service was wonderful. Small but adequate pool, room was clean with a TV and fridge.
Cons: Even though we were away from most of the 5th Avenue pedestrian and bar traffic, there was a lot of construction going on that was loud at times and 6th Avenue car traffic was heavy even during the night. However, with the a/c and ceiling fan on, it wasn't too much of a big deal. Also, the beds were very hard and uncomfortable (like as in sleeping on a box spring instead of a mattress!).
The hotel offers a discount at Mamitas Beach Club. However, we often had difficulty finding chairs with umbrellas (a necessity for our Yankee white skin!!), so we spent several days at the beach club next to Mamitas, the Kool Beach Club. We paid $14 USD a day to rent comfy chairs with a large umbrella, access to the pool and bathrooms, and beachside services for drinks and food. Pina coladas were about $5.00 each and a huge plate of chicken nachos was about $9.00. You could also get beach massages, and other water activies.
Other activities that we did: the front desk at our hotel set us up with a cab driver who took us to Akumal (Yal Ke Lagoon) for snorkeling than to the ruins at Tulum.
We really enjoyed this trip, but there were two things IMHO that were not so great. We decided to go to Yal Ke Lagoon to snorkel first thing in the AM to avoid the crowds we had read about. It is easy to enter the water and there are showers to rinse off in and bathrooms. P.S. you are not allowed to have on suntan lotion unless you can show them that it is biodegradable. I think it was about $5.00 to get in (?) per person.
However, the visibility was very poor and it was pretty shocking to see the number of people who touched or stood on the coral. We were able to see some fish, and my friend was just learning how to snorkel so it was ok for us, but for myself, having snorkeled in many areas in the Caribbean, it was pretty disappointing. As we were leaving, there were also many tour groups just arriving (around 10:00AM). Unfortunately time did not allow us to snorkel in Akumal Bay or Half Moon Bay, which I suspect might have been significantly better.
We then proceeded to the ruins at Tulum, which were beautiful. We opted not to get a guide and walk around ourselves. You are able to walk down to the beach and swim if you like. Here was the second "not-so-great thing": the crowds!!! Oh my gosh, I guess we should have known there would be a lot of people, but there were easily hundreds of people, which made it difficult to get around. I would recommend to try and get to the ruins as early in the AM as possible, before all the tour groups show up.
On the way back, we had a lovely lunch at Ana Y Jose's Hotel in Tulum, what a gorgeous beach and great salads.
Restaurants in Playa that we enjoyed (P.S. service at every restaurant was just great, everyone was so friendly and good to us):
Playasia (in the Blue Parrot Hotel)--a little pricey, but excellent suschi
La Palapa Hemingway (5th Avenue)--we had drinks here several times--good tables for people watching on 5th Avenue, and the homemade guacamole that they make right at your table is great.
La Vagabonda (5th Avenue)--we ate breakfast here one morning, good portions. They also service lunch and dinner.
There was an Italian restaurant across from the Glass Bar on 5th Avenue, something with the name Bruno in it, that was also excellent.
We also had drinks at Fusion, which has small tables right on the beach and good size drinks, and at Om (excellent chocolate martini!!). On our last evening, we went dancing at Coco Palm (located next to the Blue Parrot), and at the Blue Parrot.
Well, I think this covers most of our six day trip. Flights going down were on time and uneventful. Not so on the way home--we just got back last night after 12 hours of misery getting from Cancun to Charlotte (two hour delay because of snow storms on the east coast), missing out connection, then Charlotte to Boston, on US Air two hours after our original flight left. We made two landing attempts in Boston because the first time there was "something on the runway", as the pilot put it, and they had to jerk the plane up at the last minute. Fortunately, despite the snow, we landed safely.
But it is very, very difficult to go from 82 degrees to 30!!!! We would definitely return to Playa. Hope this trip report is helpful!!
Melissa
Feb 25th, 2008, 03:49 PM
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Hi everyone, thanks for the positive comments!!
Schmerl--I would stay there again if it was myself and friends...because it's so basic, if I went back with my hubby, we might choose a place with more ambiance. But the price was very good for high season and that made it a good deal since airfare from the east coast was high.
Austin--let me see if I can explain this correctly!! Our hotel intersected with Calle 28 (most of the hotels are in the lower street numbers, i.e, 6-10). If we walked down Calle 28 toward the beach, the beach club was on a lovely beach, with little noticeable erosion, no seaweed, and tons of chairs, several beach clubs. However, this beach is intersected by a large dock and when we crossed over the dock, the beach on the other side was much smaller, and had a lot more seaweed, and not as many people swimming. So depending where you stay, you could walk to the side where we were on--very beautiful, and even with the beach chairs, we never felt overly crowded. Hope that helps!!
Bitter--we asked the "concierge" at the front desk, who happened to have a brother who owned his own taxi so we worked out a deal. We paid $80 USD for both of us. We went to Yal Ke Lagoon first thing in the morning to try and avoid crowds snorkeling, then went directly to Tulum. We stayed at Tulum for about an hour and a half (the crowds were high at that time), and then went to lunch, stopped at the bank and we back in Playa by 3:30. We got a better deal (I believe) by going through the front desk and our driver Daniel also spoke English which was helpful. When we checked out, we did tip the concierge for his help.
I must admit that after seeing the driving, we amended our original plan of renting a car.
Schmerl--I would stay there again if it was myself and friends...because it's so basic, if I went back with my hubby, we might choose a place with more ambiance. But the price was very good for high season and that made it a good deal since airfare from the east coast was high.
Austin--let me see if I can explain this correctly!! Our hotel intersected with Calle 28 (most of the hotels are in the lower street numbers, i.e, 6-10). If we walked down Calle 28 toward the beach, the beach club was on a lovely beach, with little noticeable erosion, no seaweed, and tons of chairs, several beach clubs. However, this beach is intersected by a large dock and when we crossed over the dock, the beach on the other side was much smaller, and had a lot more seaweed, and not as many people swimming. So depending where you stay, you could walk to the side where we were on--very beautiful, and even with the beach chairs, we never felt overly crowded. Hope that helps!!
Bitter--we asked the "concierge" at the front desk, who happened to have a brother who owned his own taxi so we worked out a deal. We paid $80 USD for both of us. We went to Yal Ke Lagoon first thing in the morning to try and avoid crowds snorkeling, then went directly to Tulum. We stayed at Tulum for about an hour and a half (the crowds were high at that time), and then went to lunch, stopped at the bank and we back in Playa by 3:30. We got a better deal (I believe) by going through the front desk and our driver Daniel also spoke English which was helpful. When we checked out, we did tip the concierge for his help.
I must admit that after seeing the driving, we amended our original plan of renting a car.
Feb 26th, 2008, 06:21 AM
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We also just got back from Playa and Tulum. I would say the beaches north of Ave Constitutiones were wider. Mamitas is great, but ya gotta get there early to snag a palapa! Other very good places to eat in Playa were Yaxche on 8th, and Pesche way up on 30th across the street from the Mega Store. We have been to this area 4 times and always do a half day at Yal Ku - never been disappointed.
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