DK Travel : Cancún and the Yucatán

Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula has a special atmosphere and an immense variety of attractions, including some of the world’s best beaches and diving areas. The modern, glittering resorts of the east coast’s “Mayan Riviera” lie alongside charming old Spanish Colonial towns, sleepy Mayan villages, and the awesome remains of ancient civilizations.

Casa Maya, Isla Mujeres

All the rooms are different – some are on the beach, some are like separate little beach-houses – but all are comfortable and fitted with Mexican textiles. It’s in a delightful location, facing the placid Playa Secreto lagoon, and there’s snorkel gear for guests’ use.
Casa Mexilio, Mérida

This is a special guest-house in a fine old building. The hallways and eight rooms are full of traditional furniture, craft-work, and antiques, and the Mexican-American owners have added original touches, including a cave-like pool and two bars, one on the roof.
Casa San Juan, Mérida

Once the home of an old Mérida family, this 19th-century house has been beautifully restored with seven charming, lofty-ceilinged rooms.
Casa Tucán, Playa del Carmen

Seems small from the street, but inside is a maze of patios, gardens, and spiral staircases, leading to a leaf-shaded pool. Rooms are cosy and colorful. The friendly German owners offer packages with the Yucatek Divers school (see Tours and Special Interests).
Celestún

Just north of this fishing village is a silent, wild, watery expanse of mangrove lagoon that provides a breeding ground for great flocks of pink flamingos and ibises, egrets, and blue herons. Boat tours from the village are very popular (the lagoon can get rather crowded at times). But if you stay over in Celestún after the tours have gone back to Mérida, you will find a beautifully tranquil village, with a soft white beach, laid-back restaurants and hotels, and fabulous sunsets.
Celestún

The most famous flamingo colonies in the Yucatán are in the lagoon beside this little town on the west coast. Launches run from a visitor center toward the pink streaks of flamingos on the horizon, passing fishermen’s huts, ibises, and many other birds – an ornithologist’s delight (see also Celestún, Celestún.
Celestún

Most tourists go toCelestún only to see its flamingos, but it’s also a tranquil village with an endless white-sand beach lined by fishing boats. There are some very enjoyable beach restaurants (seeLa Palapa, Celestún) and often wonderful sunsets over the Gulf of Mexico.
Celestún

Flamingos, again, are the big attraction here, but if you stay over in one of the small hotels after the day-trippers have returned to Mérida you can sample a delightfully peaceful village, its beach strewn with fishing boats (see Celestún, Celestún). North of Celestún is a really remote beach retreat at Xixim (see Eco-Paraíso Xixim, near Celestún).
Cenote Dzitnup

This is the most spectacular of the easily accessible, swim-mable cenotes, and one of the great sights of the Yucatán. Entering through a cramped tunnel, you emerge into a vast, cathedral-like cavern, with towers of strangely shaped rock around an exquisite turquoise pool. In the middle, a shaft of sunlight falls dead straight onto the water from a hole in the roof. Everyone automatically swims through it, to be touched by this magical light.
Cenote Dzitnup

The most famous of the swimmable cenotes, a vast limestone cathedral. Via a narrow tunnel you enter a truly awe-inspiring chamber with, at the bottom, a pool of perfect turquoise water. Tour groups tend to visit about 11am–noon, but at other times it’s rarely crowded.

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Hotel price categories

For a standard, double room per night (with breakfast if included), taxes and extra charges.
- under US$20
- US$20-$45
- US$45-$80
- US$80-$130
- over US$130