Thread: Good beach in Cozumel?

Originally Posted by ellie1145

Thanks for all your suggestions. The beach looks gorgeous. We may hire a car and drive ourselves there as everything is so close and there is only one road so it should be reasonably easy to find.

Do you have to pay the resort once you get there?

Lulu, on our first ever cruise we took our children to the Mayan ruins (Christmas time) and a very interesting guide started to talk about the ruins whilst we stood and listened. Then we noticed everyone was slapping their arms and legs, and people were moving away. Then we noticed we were being badly bitten by mosquitos. They were eating us alive. We stood as long as we could but had to give in and go back to the coach. By the time we left the poor man was left with about 2 people standing listening. It put us off going back! The huge bites on our arms and legs lasted most of the cruise! Not a pretty sight.

Both my DDs & DH are still mad at me for insisting we go to Chichen Itza ... and that was about 25 years ago ....

Why, Lulu? I loved the ruins at Tulun and would like to see the larger ones....

Originally Posted by nealberk

Why, Lulu? I loved the ruins at Tulun and would like to see the larger ones....

Neal, this was about 25 years ago and a 10 tour out of Cozumel to Chichen Itza. We were on an old school bus as which you know had no a/c and it was as hot as hell and would break down every so often! The mosquitoes were about the size of small humming birds. We were send on this with a boxed lunch with a small bottle of water for each of us. Realized quickly, we needed more water. The only thing bottled thing we could find along the way was beer (not cold) so we drank that and saved the water for the girls. Toward the end, we were force feeding the girls beer to keep them somewhat hydrated. They love to pull out our photo albumn of this and point out how totally miserable we all look.

While none of us enjoyed at the time, all of us are now glad we've actually been there.

Neal, that was then ... this is now. Deb loves Mayan ruins so Chichen Itza is the one she absolutely must see.

Got it. There is a chance we will be going back down there this fall, so it is a possibility....

As another option, try the other side of the island.

If we want to spend a nice day at a beach without all the crowds, we rent a car and drive over to the east side of the island. There are some wonderful beaches over there and sometimes very few, if any, people around. While the west side of the island provides a more calm sea environment, the east side is like the ocean - sometimes lots of waves. The west side is better for swimming and snorkeling, while the east side is better for an ocean beach experience with nice breezes, beautiful scenery, and the sound of the waves. There are some nice quiet bar and grills over there offering cold beer and good food.

If you want to stay on the west side, you can rent a car or take a taxi south of the usual tourist areas and find some nice places for some great food and nice swimming without all the crowds.

When we were there last month, we just walked off the ship and enjoyed the beach righ by the pier. Only about 8 people on a beautiful beach with a bar next door - worked out very well and we had a lovely day without going anywhere.

But the good thing about Cozumel is that it's small enough to explore and sightsee within a few hours so you can find whatever it is you're looking for. But yes, it has changed oer the last 20 years since we've been going there. Not all for the good, as we really enjoyed the quiet unspoiled island the way it was, but alot of improvements have been made because of the influx of cruise money, which is not necessarily a bad thing.

As for Tulum, it is quite a distance from Cozumel - have to take a taxi/shuttle to the City Pier. Then take a ferry over to Playa del Carmen and either rent a car or take a shuttle down to Tulum. Figure at least 6 hours for the round trip. While the beach is awesome, it is not really worth the huge amount of travel time spent to get there and back.

Pete

Sorry, if I did not mention that. Yes it is quite a ways to the ruins. Actually, the bus ride is about 2 hours but you have the crossing which is not the most pleasant things in the world. If you don't usually get seasick, you probably will.

Just thought I would update you on our visit to Cozumel.

We made some enquiries at the Excursion desk on Oasis, and I have to say they were totally unhelpful. If you didn't want to buy one of their overpriced tours they just weren't interested. In fact one guy told us that there were NO free beaches on Cozumel. We had always found the tour people very helpful on Princess, so this was a bit of a shock.

We went to Guest Services and managed to speak to a very helpful young lady who apologised for the rude way we were treated, and told us of some beaches we could try. She said they were free..... but this is not quite the whole story!

We docked at the International Dock and when we disembarked we went to the car hire offices and rented a car. We drove all round the island first as it was quite early. The sea on the east side of the island was mountainous - very rough and not safe even to paddle. The tide was in very high and so there really wasn't a single beach that we could have stopped off at.

We were quite shocked at how dirty the beaches were - full of flotsam and jetsam, cans, bottles, bits of rubbish, strewn over the rocks and the sand.

The little bars etc all looked very run-down and completely deserted, so we didn't stop. One bar even had large black vultures marching around outside it in the road. Even the beach we visited the last time had no sand to speak of, the water was so high it was not safe to go near it.

If I can work out how I will post some photos.

Mind you, they are building a new road which runs parallel to the old coast road which apparently was damaged by the hurricane recently. It's a bit like the road to nowhere - we didn't pass a single other vehicle the whole drive, apart from a truck.

The drive was interesting - we were fascinated when we saw something ahead on the road and discovered that it was huge crabs walking across the road - think we made mincemeat of one unintentionally! The boys wanted us to stop and go back and pick it up, but we resisted the temptation!

It was also interesting for the two youngsters we had with us to see the grinding poverty of the less touristy parts of the island. Puts it all linto perspective.

We then went back through the town and onto the coastal road where we stopped at Paradise Beach, which was one beach which had been recommended. We were told that if we paid $2 we could use the facilities, so we bundled out of the car and paid. However, once we had paid they then told us that we had to buy drinks costing more than $10 each as well. Anyway, we wandered down to the beach where there were plenty of empty loungers, so we made camp there, expecting someone to come up to us and demand that we buy drinks - but they didn't! The beach itself was not very big and the water was very dirty and full of black seaweed. We did not feel like risking swimming in it as it looked very nasty - didn't even dip my toes in it.

However, there was a large pool which was lovely, and my friend and her granchildren and I all spent some time swimming in it. They did not actually come back to us to make us buy the drinks - though we were a bit worried that we might be hassled.

We didn't stay very long - about an hour and a half and then we went back to the car and drove back to the ship.

It certainly wasn't a very nice beach that day, but as I have already said, the sea had been very rough on the other side of the island so maybe it had brought in a lot of weed on this side, too.

I have to say that we still don't find Cozumel a great place to visit. It's ok if you just want Diamonds International or to sit in a noisy bar, but should we return we will simply stay on the ship and enjoy having it to ourselves!

Unfortunately, the huge size of Oasis does strictly limit the ports it can visit - so it's Falmouth, Labadee, Cozumel, St Thomas and St Martin or nothing. Not sure how long they can keep rolling out the same ports. As it happens we just like being on the ship so we don't really care about the ports too much, but I am not sure how frequently most people would want to visit Cozumel, for instance. Thankfully, Labadee made up for it in spade loads!

Interesting, Ellie. Thank you for the information!

Thanks, Ellie! We're going to be on Oasis in November and the ports of call are, like with you, of little importance to us.

Try Mr. Sanchos...the best beach we found in Cozumel!