Playa del Carmen sleeps late. The cenotes open at eight.
Which sinkhole is worth the drive inland from Fifth Avenue. What a Chichén Itzá day really costs once the van and the lunch are in. Whether the Tulum ruins beat Cobá when you have one free morning. Reviews of every tour you can book along this coast.
Playa del CarmenCenotes inland, the Cozumel ferry, Fifth Avenue after tenfrom $14
TulumRuins on the cliff, jungle sinkholes, the lagoon at Muyilfrom $20
The Riviera MayaThe coast road either side, Puerto Aventuras to Akumalfrom $39
Puerto MorelosA reef park off the beach, and a square that shuts earlyfrom $35
The four bookings a first week in Playa del Carmen is built on.
A jungle morning, the long day inland, Tulum from the top of the cliff, and a night eating your way off the avenue. What each costs, and what the people who took it say.
01The first morningFrom Playa del Carmen ATV Adventure with Ziplines, CenoteQuad tracks through the bush, a zipline, and a swim in a cenote to finish. Take it early in the week and early in the day, before the heat sets in.
02The day inlandChichen Itza, Cenote and Valladolid Small Group Day TripChichén Itzá at opening, a cenote to get the sweat off, lunch in Valladolid on the way home. Ten hours, and the only version of this day worth taking.
03Tulum in a dayTulum Guided Tour, Magical Cenote, Lagoon Snorkeling and Beachside LunchThe cliff-top ruins, a cenote and the lagoon, finishing on the sand. The site opens at eight and the coaches are in by ten, so go first.
04The eveningPlaya del Carmen Walking Food TourTaquerías and mezcal a couple of streets back from Fifth Avenue, with somebody who eats there. Three hours, and you will not want dinner after it.
The Yucatán has no rivers. It has cenotes, and they are why you drive inland.
Rain worked through the limestone here for a hundred thousand years and left a flooded cave system under the whole peninsula. Open pools you walk into, half-collapsed caverns, sinkholes you climb down a ladder to reach. Three kinds of cenote day, and what it costs to get in the water.
Playa del Carmen, Tulum, and the coast either side of them.
One town has the ferry, the avenue and the late nights. The next has ruins on a cliff and jungle sinkholes behind it. North of both is a fishing village with a reef park off the beach. Four bases, and the best day out from each.
Every good ruin on this coast is a day trip, and the vans leave before six.
Chichén Itzá is two and a half hours inland and worth every one of them. Cobá is nearer, greener and half the crowd. Tulum you can be through before breakfast. Valladolid is where the lunch is. These three carry more travellers than anything else away from the sand.
The days out most travellers on this coast end up taking.
Every tour on the Riviera Maya →The tours that fill first here, and what earns each of them the slot.
1
Chichen Itza, Cenote and Valladolid Small Group Day Trip
Review of a Tulum day trip to Chichen Itza, Valladolid, and Cenote Xux Ha, with lunch, transfers, practical tips, and honest value advice.
From · $214
Read our review →
2
From Playa del Carmen ATV Adventure with Ziplines, Cenote
from $49
3
Tulum Guided Tour, Magical Cenote, Lagoon Snorkeling and Beachside Lunch
from $169
4
VIP Chichen Itza Private Tour
from $285
5
Playa del Carmen Buggy Tour with Cenote Swim and Mayan Village Visit
from $99
6
Tulum Ruins, Turtles in Akumal and Cenote tour
from $129
7
Playa del Carmen Walking Food Tour
from $84
8
Jungle Buggy Tour from Playa del Carmen Including Cenote Swim
from $110
Tulum is a ruin on a cliff with forty minutes of jungle behind it.
The archaeological site is small and sits directly over a swimming beach, which is the whole trick of it. Go at opening. The rest of the day belongs to Dos Ojos, Gran Cenote and the lagoon at Muyil, none of them more than half an hour off the road.
Every Tulum day out →
What a day out on the Riviera Maya actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it costs. A good number of the best days here come in under the price of a beach-club lunch.
Cenote mornings, the Tulum ruins run, reef snorkeling off Puerto Morelos and the short trips inland.
The full-day standards: Chichén Itzá with lunch, jungle quad circuits, catamaran days out of Puerto Aventuras.
Private guides, chartered boats, and the Sian Ka’an days that eat the whole of the daylight.
Three things that happen here and almost nowhere else.
Beaches and pyramids exist all over the tropics. A dry river you walk through under the jungle, a biosphere you enter along canals the Maya cut, and a bay where green turtles graze twenty metres off the sand do not.
Rio Secreto
A river runs beneath the jungle south of Playa and you walk in it: helmet on, water at your waist, half a kilometre of stalactites that are still growing. Groups are small and guided because there is no other way to be down there. Phones go in a locker at the door, which turns out to be the point of it.
- 1Rio Secreto and Tulum Tour from Cancun or Riviera Maya Hotels★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 429 reviews
- 2Rio Secreto Plus: Classic Tour, Bycicle, Rappel & Ziplines★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 365 reviews
- 3Rio Secreto Guided Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 177 reviews
Sian Ka’an
Below Tulum the tarmac gives up and a biosphere reserve takes over: mangrove, lagoon, and canals the Maya cut through the reeds a thousand years ago to move trade boats inland. You float them lying back in a life jacket and the current does the work. Punta Allen, at the far end, is a two-hour sand track.
- 1Sian Ka’an Adventure Full Day Trip to Punta Allen★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,179 reviews
- 2Tulum Archaeological Site & Sian Ka’an Muyil Tour from Tulum★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 824 reviews
- 3Mayan Ruins & Sian Kaan Tour with Boat Ride and Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 423 reviews
Akumal
Akumal bay has a seagrass meadow that starts a few strokes off the sand, and green turtles come in to graze it most mornings. Numbers in the water are capped now and everyone goes with a guide inside a roped lane, which is exactly why the turtles still turn up. Be there at eight, before the boats.
- 1Tulum Ruins, Turtles in Akumal and Cenote tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,706 reviews
- 2Hidden Cenote Swim: Snorkeling, Sea Turtles and Beachside Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,222 reviews
- 3Full Day Tulum Ruins Tour Cenote and Swimming with Sea Turtles★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,171 reviews
Four bookings on this coast that will not wait.
Most of the Riviera Maya can be arranged over breakfast the day before. These four run on capped groups, permit systems and a season, none of which take any interest in when your flight lands.
- 01Chichen Itza, Cenote and Valladolid Small Group Day TripThe site opens at eight and closes at five, and it is two and a half hours each way. The small-group vans that make that timing bearable go first.
- 02Rio Secreto and Tulum Tour from Cancun or Riviera Maya HotelsYou go in with a guide, in a group of fixed size, on a booked slot. There is no ticket window to turn up at.
- 03Sian Ka’an Adventure Full Day Trip to Punta AllenEntry runs through permitted boat operators, and the sand road down to Punta Allen takes two hours each way. It is a dawn start or it is nothing.
- 04Whale Shark Encounter Full-Day all inclusive Tour from Riviera MayaThe sharks are only in these waters from roughly mid-May to mid-September, and the number of boats allowed out on any day is capped.
When the seaweed lands, the Riviera Maya moves inland.
From spring into late summer the current pushes rafts of sargassum onto the Caribbean-facing beaches, and some mornings the sand is brown and the swim is not worth the walk. The coast has its answer built into the geology. Everything good here is a short drive inland and underground, where the water is fresh, clear and cold all year round.
By place, north to south and then inland
By kind of day: water, ruin, jungle or table
Puerto Morelos down to Tulum, then inland: how this coast lines up.
The newest reviews from Playa del Carmen and the coast.
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