Recommendations for Non-Divers

[judydivescoz]

Sailing with Dario/Kim--> Cozumel Boat Trips
Surf lessons with Nacho on the east side-->Cozumel Surfing
Fishing-->Albatros Charters
Discover Mexico Park

Great suggestions!!!

 

[zzzScuba]

They might do a Discover Dive, but they don't want to spend their vacation getting certified.

Get em certified while there...

 

[DandyDon]

Para sailing? :shocked2: When your trip insurance excludes something, think twice.

I've never spent any time at Punta Sur, but am planning to next time. Check out the birds, crocodiles, etc. Heard the tours are fun.

I'm with the others.... day trips or even an overnight trip over to mainland to visit the Mayan ruins.... Tulum (small but pretty), Coba (good), and Chichen Itza (huge, best done as an overnight trip due to distance from PDC). Other ruins worth seeing over there also but those are the 3 biggies for most tourists.
Mayan Ruins Mexico: Yucatan Peninsula Mayan Ruins, Mexico

We did Coba in August last year. Carry a backpack with two quarts of water and rent a bike, but go in the afternoon and spend the night to do the park early if possible. Do Tulum ruins on the way back; totally different.

Robin, how long is the drive from PDC to Chichen Itza? Thinking about doing an overnight there, park in the morning, maybe the other ruins nearby, then heading back to Coz.

 

[greylion]

There is a nice golf course on Cozumel where they can try out some new profanities?

After the golf they'll need some margaritas, see the where to eat thread. Wet Wendy's has some good ones just off the square.

 

[zzzScuba]

Forget the golf... they should just go straight to the Margaritas!

 

[robint]

Para sailing? :shocked2: When your trip insurance excludes something, think twice.

I've never spent any time at Punta Sur, but am planning to next time. Check out the birds, crocodiles, etc. Heard the tours are fun.

We did Coba in August last year. Carry a backpack with two quarts of water and rent a bike, but go in the afternoon and spend the night to do the park early if possible. Do Tulum ruins on the way back; totally different.

Robin, how long is the drive from PDC to Chichen Itza? Thinking about doing an overnight there, park in the morning, maybe the other ruins nearby, then heading back to Coz.

that is exactly what we did!
We did our morning dives, had lunch at resort, then took ferry over to PDC. The car rental agency we rented with said they would pick us up at dock. What they meant was someone would meet us, then we would follow him walking over a mile, then get in car and drive another mile back through traffic to the rental agency. Then it would take another hour to get paperwork done, car washed (if they were going to do this, why didn't they do it before we arrrived?). So it was mid-afternoon before we were on the road.

We used the Mayan Adventures map (www.cancunmap.com), followed it up to the tollroad just south of Cancun, and off we went towards Piste. The map has the gas stations along way marked which helped tremendously! We got gas just before the tollroad started. It got dark while we were on the tollroad (another reason we took it instead of backroads) and we found the road pretty smooth and well lit. I don't remember exactly how long it took, but we were checked into our hotel and sitting at restaurant eating dinner around 8pm.

Chichen Itza opens at 8am and I HIGHLY recommend you get there when they open. Guides will be already asking people if they want a tour... our guide, Philippe, met us in parking lot. He had his credentials around his neck (be sure to hire someone with this neckace tag to ensure they are official guides) so we told him we would go with him. He was fabulous, answered questions, had an album of color photos and drawings, etc. to show along the way and help explain everything. Well worth the $$$ for your group. Also, the fee is per group, not per person. We finished our tour with him around 11am, so he did a full 3 hour tour for us. After that he ran off to get another group, we headed off towards the exit and to buy some stuff.

My trip report, photos, and video: http://www.rnrscuba.net/MayanRuins/ChichenItza_March2009.html

As we were leaving, at 11am, all the tour buses were arriving... there were at least two dozen buses in parking lot and hundreds of people in line to pay!!! There were tourists from the resorts, there were tourists from Mexican schools, there were hundreds and hundreds of people flooding into the park. Perfect time to leave!! As you can see from my photos, there weren't that many people there early in the morning. In fact, we recognized many of them from our hotel.

We left CI and drove on the backroad to Valladolid. We wanted to stop for lunch there at the restaurant recommended on the Mayan Adventures map - Cenote Zaci, right in town. It was fantastic, a huge palapa open-air, and overlooking a huge cenote. Food was really good and cheap. We left there and got on the tollway for the drive back to PDC. We dropped off the car and walked to the ferry, making the 5pm back to Coz. So I am guessing the total drive was 3.5 to 4 hours, with stops for gas.

I highly recommend this trip but do spend the night in that area. We stayed at one of the hotels right in Piste, next to Chichen Itza, but there are lots of hotels on map between there and Valladolid which would be cheaper. We booked our hotel on Expedia before we left, it was less than $100 for the night. Loved the hotel, we would stay there again or one of the other two right at CI. We do plan to do this again, but next time we will stay at least 2 nights in area, doing other attactions on map in that area, including Ek Balam, smaller cenotes, and the night magic at CI.

my video: [vimeo]4098985[/vimeo]

robin

 

[DandyDon]

Haha, you had one of those car rental guys! Been there, done that - except in my experiences the guy failed to meet us both times, but I knew where the office was a few blocks from the ferry. Last time they couldn't find my reservation and I failed to take a print-out, but they found me a larger car with auto trans and gave me a rate better than I'd booked so I won a little with the hassle. That had to be irritating spending half the afternoon renting a reserved car. I think they wait to see if we will actually show up, then see if they have one.

I've done the toll road to Valldolid (VDD), by mistake on the way to Holbox - except it doesn't go there, before the maps were improved. A nice hiway but I do want to get a much earlier start, lunch on the run, faster car experience (I won't go that far before I turn around and rent from someone closer!), drive by Tulum & Coba, maybe a Cenote close to VDD or the night show at the ruins. Something along those lines I think.

Glad to hear you liked the hotel; from the video I see it's the one I was considering - same chain as the one I would use at Coba if I went there again. Orbitz is offering the Villas Arquelogicas for $55/64 with taxes for the night in August I'm considering. I've never liked anything I've seen about Expedia; Sidestep generally gives me good leads, usually with Orbitz but I like to start with Sidestep and sometimes they list Expedia choices but generally higher. If you liked the hotel tho, I'm sure we'll be fine there. There is always someone on TripAdiser who doesn't like a place but the only critic I noticed was upset about the lack of TV. Blah!

If we follow your fine suggestions, do Chichen Itza from 8 to 11 or so, lunch on the run, then I think we can do Ek Balam next, maybe a cenote - walk not swim, and get back to PDC in time for dinner, ferry back to Coz in time to pack gear we left drying in the rooms ok. We have the Coz rooms for the week so cheap that we'll just leave most of our stuff in them while we're away for the night.

I'll back to check out your pics and vids more. Thanks!

 

[robint]

yes, Don, we would have taken the road by Coba up to CI if we had been starting early in day, but since we knew it would be getting dark we decided to skip the topes and potholes and go for the tollroad. It is a bit slower, but well lit and no potholes at all.

the other 2 hotels by Piste are nice, too. One in fact has a back walkway into the park, I guess they have a gate there to pay. It was a bit more expensive so we drove around to the main gate from our hotel and paid for parking in the big lot. So it all depends how you want to do it. I kinda liked going in the front gate, our first visit, to get the full affect. Next time we would probably go through that back gate since we are familiar with the layout.

do get the guide though! I thought I knew everything about CI, but he can give you lots of new info, history of the actual excavation, stories, etc. Our guide gave us the "official story" and then gave us his feelings about the true story. It was very interesting as I tended to agree with him, some of the "official story" is just hype meant to make the Mayans out to be really scary warriors, i.e. better for tourism. There are dozens of guides standing at the gate, waiting to be hired. Our guide also gave us info on the new areas being excavated and they should be opening up to tourists in the near future according to him. Good to know!

robin

 

[judydivescoz]

Robin, this is exactly the trip we want to take in August. Where did you stay in Chichen Itza ? Would you stay there again?

 

[DandyDon]

Nice vid and super pics, Robin...!

Robin, this is exactly the trip we want to take in August. Where did you stay in Chichen Itza ? Would you stay there again?

It's in the first minute of her video, and do play it full screen...!

Glad to hear you liked the hotel; from the video I see it's the one I was considering - same chain as the one I would use at Coba if I went there again. Orbitz is offering the Villas Arquelogicas for $55/64 with taxes for the night in August I'm considering. I've never liked anything I've seen about Expedia; Sidestep generally gives me good leads, usually with Orbitz but I like to start with Sidestep and sometimes they list Expedia choices but generally higher. If you liked the hotel tho, I'm sure we'll be fine there. There is always someone on TripAdiser who doesn't like a place but the only critic I noticed was upset about the lack of TV. Blah!