Cancún and the Riviera Maya
Centro Integralmente Planeado (FONATUR) · Cancún, Quintana Roo
The Caribbean coast of Quintana Roo and the largest tourist flow in Latin America. Cancun did not grow: it was chosen. In 1970 a Mexican government computer model picked an empty sandbar of fishing camps and mangrove as the site of a planned resort, and the first hotels opened in 1974 on a 22-kilometre spit between the Caribbean and the Nichupte lagoon. South of it the Riviera Maya runs about 120 kilometres to Tulum through Puerto Morelos, Playa del Carmen and Akumal, backed by jungle full of cenotes and fronted by the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef, the second largest reef system on earth. Every beach in Mexico is federal property and public by law, including the sand in front of every resort. Expect high prices and crowds in the hotel zone, with ferries to the islands, seasonal sargassum seaweed from spring to autumn, and far better value in downtown Cancun and Playa del Carmen, plus free public beaches.
Playa Delfines, Boulevard Kukulcán km 17.5, Zona Hotelera, Cancún, Quintana Roo, 77500, Mexico
⚠ AN OPEN COAST - the beaches are federal public land, free and open at all times, and the signposted accesos públicos in the Zona Hotelera are the way onto them. ⚠ SARGASSUM SEASON RUNS ROUGHLY APRIL TO OCTOBER, worst May to August, and varies enormously by beach and by year - check the current monitoring maps the week you travel. ⚠ HURRICANE SEASON IS 1 JUNE TO 30 NOVEMBER, peaking August to October. ⚠ TAKE THE ADO BUS FROM THE AIRPORT, not the terminal taxi desks, and agree every taxi fare before getting in. Individual attractions, cenotes, ferries and archaeological sites keep their own hours and prices. ⚠ NOTHING HERE WAS VERIFIED FOR THIS FILE.
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