Cancun Tours??

rana1

Hi Guys

Im flyng off to cancun next week, can anyone recommend a good online tour operator for booking few excurtions.

Thanks

FLINT

Hi there, I have been to Cancun twice and can honestly say that you won't regret it. On past experience the first time we went we booked all our excursions via the holiday tour rep, ok but not very good value. The second time around the few trips that we went on were all booked via the various agencies that you will com across in the reosrt shopping complexes.We did the usual trips on offer to the Mayan ruins Chichen Itza ( very long day from Cancun approx 4hrs drive), Tulum etc aswell as swimming with Dolphins and Manatees, however the best day by far was not offered by the tour rep,http://www.alltournative.com/If I remember rightly we did the Maya encounter, very enjoyable and met some lovely people.If you have more questions feel free to PM me. By the way which hotel you staying at?

rana1

Hi FLINT

its my first time to cancun, going for two weeks with my other half, booked in Temptations Spa and Resort, heard alot of good things about the resort. there are few opertors i found on the net with reasonable excurtion prices. But im not to keen to hand out my card details to these unknown sites.

bytheway can you tell me if its gonna be cheaper for me to book the tours online rather then going into cancun and booking it there personaly?

so far via my research iv decided to do few excurtions..

Chichen itza ( ceapest i can find is $52 )
Jungle speed boat tour
Xcaret? is this realy worth seeing? bit pricey for a park.
Isla Mujres boat tour
coco Bongo ( heard alot of good things about this club)
Salvatica Canopy

Its a once in a life time opportunity so i want to make most of it. is there anything you would recommend?

Mr_Lahey

rana1 wrote: »

Hi FLINT

its my first time to cancun, going for two weeks with my other half, booked in Temptations Spa and Resort, heard alot of good things about the resort. there are few opertors i found on the net with reasonable excurtion prices. But im not to keen to hand out my card details to these unknown sites.

bytheway can you tell me if its gonna be cheaper for me to book the tours online rather then going into cancun and booking it there personaly?

so far via my research iv decided to do few excurtions..

Chichen itza ( ceapest i can find is $52 )
Jungle speed boat tour
Xcaret? is this realy worth seeing? bit pricey for a park.
Isla Mujres boat tour
coco Bongo ( heard alot of good things about this club)
Salvatica Canopy

Its a once in a life time opportunity so i want to make most of it. is there anything you would recommend?

Cancun is as expensive as you let it be. If you use local buses and local boats etc you will save a fortune.

Make your way to Downtown ($0.5) then catch a bus to Chitchen Itza $14 return, entry is about $9

If you travel to Isla Majures (which is beautiful) from Cancun you will pay about $15 return, however, get the bus to Puerto Juarez which is about 15 mins north of Cancun ($0.50 on bus) and then get the boat from there $3.50 return.

Anyone who books tours with their holiday rep is just asking to get shafted, if in doubt - ask a local.

My tip - take your own snorkel stuff, you will be told certain area's are off limits and you must rent their equipment - It is rubbish, just jump in and enjoy yourself. Also, in Mexico no beach is off limits. Mexican law says that anyone can go on any beach or in any part of the water you want, so if the beach you would love to go to is part of a hotel - Walk through the lobby and go chill out. You will not and can not be stopped.

FLINT

Hi there I would echo some of the setiments of the above poster re travel around Cancun, there is a regular bus service that runs around the hotel zone and is extremely cheap. Personally I would not be adventurous enough to visit Chichen Itza on the public transport, I did an organised trip yes it may have cost more but the coach was comfortably air conditioned, refreshments were included etc.I did not visit Isla Mujeres so cannot comment. I would attend the welcome meeting to get ideas from the tour rep as to what trips are available but again I would book in resort with the agents. We did not visit Coco Bongo's and I'm dissapointed we did not because everyone we spoke to gave it very good reviews. I had not heard of the Salvatica Canopy tour, I have just googled it and if I had seen that previous I would have done it. The good thing I found about Mexico / Cancun was that there is as much or as little to do as you wish. Have a fantastic time ( not jealous in anyway LOL).I went to CUBA last year and this September off to the Dominican Republic.

neas

we are going in two weeks a monday (so you will be coming back when we get there i guess).

We are going to sandos beach spa resort... in playa del carmen ... looked at tempations resort but it looked like a resort for swinging singles (name a bit dodgy lol :P).

Either way a hotel is just a base.

We are thinking of doing the following:

Captain Hook Lobster boat meal
Chitchzen Itcha (Day trip as its too far.. so will book this)
Tulum and Coba (we will try and bus it here to save cash... for some sourveoinirs)

Theres 3 eco parks... Xcaret (said to be best of 3), Xel Ha (similar to Xcaret but with bigger dolphin pools) and Xplor (which basically has Zip lines, small 'atv's uderground rivers and boat swims. If you do all 3 and book on their website (would have to have a credit card that doesnt screw you over... i.e santander zero card) its 200 USD each for all 3 parks.

Also theres Islas Mujeres which we are going to try and get to.. as well as visiting cancun from playa.

There seems to be SOOO much to do you cant possibly do it all... altho mayan encounter seems (on paper) like something i'd love to do too.

We trying to do all 7-8 of these things lol :P.

We were thinking of hiring a car so we could drive to Coba, Tulum and maybe even chitzhen itcha but we are thinking against it due to hearing of corruption of local police and all of other ruins being on bus routes (ADO routes i think).

We hope we can do all of these things .. and get some cool souvenirs.

FLINT

Hi there Neas, having been to Xel Ha myself a couple of years ago I can recommend this as a thoroughly good day out but personally wouldn't have done Xcaret aswell ( Xplor was not available when i went). As for hiring a car to get to some of the Mayan ruins I personally wouldn't have done this especially for Chichen Itza as it is a long way although it is a magnificent place to visit, I'm not sure if you are still able to climb to the top of the great pyramid anymore. We did and the views over the surrounding jungle were immense, there are plenty of stalls outside all the sites, Tulum, Coba etc and the prices for some lovely soveneirs are a pittance for the work that must go into them.

neas

Thanks Flint!.

Thing is we want to do Xcaret and Xplor.... but for something like 30 dollars more (if you buy the combo package) you can go to all 3. (Xcaret is 99 (89 online discount) USD for plus package which is recommended) Xplor is99 again (89 USD online discount)

So basically for 20 dollars more you can go for all 3. Idea was to swim with dolpins at Xel Ha... but we may go up to Isla Mujeres to do that now.

neas

Another thing, can you turn up at isla mujeres and get a dolphin swim or do you have to book slots fairly in advance? or can you do this at your hotel?

I saw the price is $169 for Royal encounter which is the foot push thing :P.. would be nice Any other costs involved?

neas

Also can anyone recommend a good tour company for Chitzhen Itcha? Sorry to be a bugbear

FLINT

Hi neas,I did the dolphin swim at Puerta Aventuras which is not far from where you will be staying, we did a package where we swam with Manatees, Stingrays and the highlight of the day was the dolphin swim we got to do the Foot Push, the Pull along and a couple of other things. We bought an excellent DVD souveneir and still show people today.Just noticed on the Dolphin Discovery website that they have an offer on for 15% off. As for Chichen Itza, I would price it with your tour company then speak to one of the tour companies in resort. Over the two visits we did the following excursions:TulumChichen ItzaDolphin DiscoveryCoba / Mayan EncounterJungle Tour ( Speed boats)Xel Ha

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I think this was combined with a half day at Tulum.Taking part in this thread has made me jealous and wanting to go back.