Anyone been to Cancun?
#12
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All inclusive is good if you don't want to be bar hoppin all the time.
That Moon Palace place, there's like a main building with the lobby, restaurants, etc and then other buildings where the rooms are at. In the middle of the whole compound is this huge ass pool with bridges over it and swim-up bars.
So if you go to a place like that, you can spend a whole lot of time chillin at the pool, drinkin drinks, getting a tan, and eating at the restaurants. Then when you want to have some kind of adventure other than that, you can go to the rest of the city, or on some trip, or whatever. Like, we hit up the mayan ruins at Chichen Itza and Tulum.
Also for one day we went to this little ass town called Akumal which is one of the most beautiful places I ever been. It's about 60 miles south of Cancun. The main beach is a little bay that's separated from the ocean by a coral reef. You can go snorkeling or scuba diving right off the beach, there's all kindsa tropical fish and no boats to worry about. It's like, oh man, just friggin beautiful, and not an overdone tourist trap like Cancun. There's a few smaller hotels there, a coupla restaurants, some dive shops, nothing major. One of the restaurants has awesome flautas. Definitely worth making the trip for part of a day, or if you don't care about being around all the party atmosphere in Cancun you could just make the trip to Akumal.
That Moon Palace place, there's like a main building with the lobby, restaurants, etc and then other buildings where the rooms are at. In the middle of the whole compound is this huge ass pool with bridges over it and swim-up bars.
So if you go to a place like that, you can spend a whole lot of time chillin at the pool, drinkin drinks, getting a tan, and eating at the restaurants. Then when you want to have some kind of adventure other than that, you can go to the rest of the city, or on some trip, or whatever. Like, we hit up the mayan ruins at Chichen Itza and Tulum.
Also for one day we went to this little ass town called Akumal which is one of the most beautiful places I ever been. It's about 60 miles south of Cancun. The main beach is a little bay that's separated from the ocean by a coral reef. You can go snorkeling or scuba diving right off the beach, there's all kindsa tropical fish and no boats to worry about. It's like, oh man, just friggin beautiful, and not an overdone tourist trap like Cancun. There's a few smaller hotels there, a coupla restaurants, some dive shops, nothing major. One of the restaurants has awesome flautas. Definitely worth making the trip for part of a day, or if you don't care about being around all the party atmosphere in Cancun you could just make the trip to Akumal.
#13
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I went there....we stayed at the Myan Palace. It was really nice, but all the big resorts down there are.
We stayed in Playa Del Carmen when we went, it's about 30 minutes south of Cancun and I would stay there again in a heart beat. Playa is MUCH nicer than Cancun. Cancun is all really big resorts and you can't walk around anywhere because you have to walk past giant resorts so you end up taking cabs everywhere....In playa you take one 5 minute cab ride to 5th avenue and then you can walk from shop to shop, stop at a bar, get something to eat, see the sites, hop on the ferry to Cozumel (an island off the coast with a ton of stuff to do) or just go to the beach. I personally like the beaches better at Playa Del Carmen but Cancun is good too.
The best part about Playa is if you want to go to Cancun it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to go to Cozumel it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to see some Myan ruins Tulum is 30 minutes away (Tulum is the only Myan ruins on the water), and if you want to go to a really cool nature reserve and snorkle Xel Ha is 20 minutes away....all those places are an hour or more from Cancun. Playa Del Carmen is the place to be now... Cancun is over developed. Oh, and plan on spending about 2-3 hours at the Cancun airport....at least we did....there are so many people and it is such a small airport that you spend forever in line...but it's worth it. Just make sure you have a disc man and a portable fan (most of the airport is not air conditioned). Oh, btw I was just there in June so this info should be pretty up to date.
We stayed in Playa Del Carmen when we went, it's about 30 minutes south of Cancun and I would stay there again in a heart beat. Playa is MUCH nicer than Cancun. Cancun is all really big resorts and you can't walk around anywhere because you have to walk past giant resorts so you end up taking cabs everywhere....In playa you take one 5 minute cab ride to 5th avenue and then you can walk from shop to shop, stop at a bar, get something to eat, see the sites, hop on the ferry to Cozumel (an island off the coast with a ton of stuff to do) or just go to the beach. I personally like the beaches better at Playa Del Carmen but Cancun is good too.
The best part about Playa is if you want to go to Cancun it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to go to Cozumel it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to see some Myan ruins Tulum is 30 minutes away (Tulum is the only Myan ruins on the water), and if you want to go to a really cool nature reserve and snorkle Xel Ha is 20 minutes away....all those places are an hour or more from Cancun. Playa Del Carmen is the place to be now... Cancun is over developed. Oh, and plan on spending about 2-3 hours at the Cancun airport....at least we did....there are so many people and it is such a small airport that you spend forever in line...but it's worth it. Just make sure you have a disc man and a portable fan (most of the airport is not air conditioned). Oh, btw I was just there in June so this info should be pretty up to date.
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Originally Posted by LABARINTH
I went there....we stayed at the Myan Palace. It was really nice, but all the big resorts down there are.
We stayed in Playa Del Carmen when we went, it's about 30 minutes south of Cancun and I would stay there again in a heart beat. Playa is MUCH nicer than Cancun. Cancun is all really big resorts and you can't walk around anywhere because you have to walk past giant resorts so you end up taking cabs everywhere....In playa you take one 5 minute cab ride to 5th avenue and then you can walk from shop to shop, stop at a bar, get something to eat, see the sites, hop on the ferry to Cozumel (an island off the coast with a ton of stuff to do) or just go to the beach. I personally like the beaches better at Playa Del Carmen but Cancun is good too.
The best part about Playa is if you want to go to Cancun it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to go to Cozumel it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to see some Myan ruins Tulum is 30 minutes away (Tulum is the only Myan ruins on the water), and if you want to go to a really cool nature reserve and snorkle Xel Ha is 20 minutes away....all those places are an hour or more from Cancun. Playa Del Carmen is the place to be now... Cancun is over developed. Oh, and plan on spending about 2-3 hours at the Cancun airport....at least we did....there are so many people and it is such a small airport that you spend forever in line...but it's worth it. Just make sure you have a disc man and a portable fan (most of the airport is not air conditioned). Oh, btw I was just there in June so this info should be pretty up to date.
We stayed in Playa Del Carmen when we went, it's about 30 minutes south of Cancun and I would stay there again in a heart beat. Playa is MUCH nicer than Cancun. Cancun is all really big resorts and you can't walk around anywhere because you have to walk past giant resorts so you end up taking cabs everywhere....In playa you take one 5 minute cab ride to 5th avenue and then you can walk from shop to shop, stop at a bar, get something to eat, see the sites, hop on the ferry to Cozumel (an island off the coast with a ton of stuff to do) or just go to the beach. I personally like the beaches better at Playa Del Carmen but Cancun is good too.
The best part about Playa is if you want to go to Cancun it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to go to Cozumel it's less than 30 minutes away, if you want to see some Myan ruins Tulum is 30 minutes away (Tulum is the only Myan ruins on the water), and if you want to go to a really cool nature reserve and snorkle Xel Ha is 20 minutes away....all those places are an hour or more from Cancun. Playa Del Carmen is the place to be now... Cancun is over developed. Oh, and plan on spending about 2-3 hours at the Cancun airport....at least we did....there are so many people and it is such a small airport that you spend forever in line...but it's worth it. Just make sure you have a disc man and a portable fan (most of the airport is not air conditioned). Oh, btw I was just there in June so this info should be pretty up to date.
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#16
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Originally Posted by 94civicEX
Thanks for the advice dude. I think this sounds like what I'd want to do. How much time did you spend there? How much was it to get to Tulum and stuff? Oh man I need lots of details.
We were there for 1 week and we were so busy. You really need 2 weeks there if you want to get to even 1/10th of the stuff there.
I don't remember exactly how much stuff was. For Tulum we booked an all day trip to Xel Ha and then Tulum. You spend 4 hours or so at Xel Ha (where you can snorkle, scuba, swim with dolphins, etc.) and all food and drinks are included. Then you leave and go to Tulum where a guide walks you around for about an hour and tells you all about the history and everything. Then you are given another hour to walk around on your own. I think it was around $80- $100 per person which I thought was a good price considering it included everything. I think we ended up spending around $3,000 while were were there on top of the hotel. But our resort wasn't all inclusive so we went out to really nice restaraunts all the time and did buy a lot of souvenirs.
You should also look up Xcaret. It is similar to Xel Ha but I heard it is much bigger. We didn't get a chance to go but we heard good things.
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Originally Posted by LABARINTH
We were there for 1 week and we were so busy. You really need 2 weeks there if you want to get to even 1/10th of the stuff there.
I don't remember exactly how much stuff was. For Tulum we booked an all day trip to Xel Ha and then Tulum. You spend 4 hours or so at Xel Ha (where you can snorkle, scuba, swim with dolphins, etc.) and all food and drinks are included. Then you leave and go to Tulum where a guide walks you around for about an hour and tells you all about the history and everything. Then you are given another hour to walk around on your own. I think it was around $80- $100 per person which I thought was a good price considering it included everything. I think we ended up spending around $3,000 while were were there on top of the hotel. But our resort wasn't all inclusive so we went out to really nice restaraunts all the time and did buy a lot of souvenirs.
You should also look up Xcaret. It is similar to Xel Ha but I heard it is much bigger. We didn't get a chance to go but we heard good things.
I don't remember exactly how much stuff was. For Tulum we booked an all day trip to Xel Ha and then Tulum. You spend 4 hours or so at Xel Ha (where you can snorkle, scuba, swim with dolphins, etc.) and all food and drinks are included. Then you leave and go to Tulum where a guide walks you around for about an hour and tells you all about the history and everything. Then you are given another hour to walk around on your own. I think it was around $80- $100 per person which I thought was a good price considering it included everything. I think we ended up spending around $3,000 while were were there on top of the hotel. But our resort wasn't all inclusive so we went out to really nice restaraunts all the time and did buy a lot of souvenirs.
You should also look up Xcaret. It is similar to Xel Ha but I heard it is much bigger. We didn't get a chance to go but we heard good things.
It's looking like hotel + flight to an all inclusive place for 4 nights would be ~$1,500. But, if you're going on these day trips, it sounds like you'd miss your meals if you were at an all-inclusive resort.
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