My wife and I are looking for a warm place to spend a week next April, yes it’s still cold and dreary where I live that time of year, and we came across Playa Del Carmen. I know that it’s a primarily a tourist area, with hotels and condos, and I know that it’s not far from Cancun, but that’s about all I know.
If you have been there and can comment on it that would be great.
We’re looking for a relatively quiet vacation with time at the beach along with visiting Mayan ruins and other local sights of interest. And we don’t plan to have a car. How are the beaches and how clean/clear is the water? How easy is it to get around? We are American if that matters.
I’ve never stayed in Playa, but I’ve stayed further south. The whole coast is great, and if you find a place that you’re willing to stay in, you’ll have a good time. Plenty of English is spoken, people are friendly, and you definitely won’t be the only foreigner.
You won’t need a car. There are plenty of taxis (settle on a price before getting in), or you can take a colectivo to the ruins and other destinations up and down the highway. They’re cheap, safe, and full of other tourists, too.
We stayed there in June for a week. The beaches are nice although for the past couple of years they’ve struggled with a seaweed problem. It varies from season to season so you might get lucky. The water is OK but not nearly as nice as it is across the bay at Cozumel. Basically, it’s just a standard resort town.
I love Playa and would retire there if I could. This website was very helpful when I first started thinking about visiting- http://www.playa.info/
It’s a beautiful, laid back, casual town about an hour south of the Cancun airport. While this has been a particularly weedy year on the beach, usually, the water is clear and the beaches are nice with fine white sand. The resorts keep them clean even though the beach itself is not hotel property and open to the public. Playa is one of the few beach areas you can visit where there are few, if any, vendors on the beach pushing souvenirs and hair braiding, so it retains its peaceful atmosphere.
Like Balthisar said, almost everyone speaks English. The people are very friendly and welcoming. The town itself is a mix of charming shops and restaurants, and the ubiquitous Señor Frogs-type clubs and fluorescent souvenir shops. The main tourist area on the south side of town is walkable by most people, though I like to spread it all out over a few days and/or evenings, and the north end of town is growing quickly. You will have no trouble finding a taxi to and from your hotel or condo if you don’t stay right in town.
I’ve stayed at a couple of All-Inclusive resorts around Playa on what they call the Mayan Riviera from Cancun to Tolum. Great diving and snorkeling and the high point was diving the reefs off of Cozumel. As far as ruins go, Chichen Itza is inland a ways and we made a full day of it. Tolum, while not as impressive as Chichen Itza is spectacularly located overlooking the Caribbean.
I visited Cancun and Playa del Carmen only very, very briefly while on one of those cruise ship tours. The ship’s itinerary had been diverted from Cancun and Cozumel to Cancun and Playa del Carmen due to (cruise ship) overcrowding in Cozumel, if I recall correctly.
I enjoyed Playa del Carmen so much that I think it was the highlight of the cruise. I recall it being small and kinda quaint appearing (for what must obviously be a large, heavily visited tourist town). The beach was nice, there was a town center where vendors were selling fresh fruit cups and ice cream, and also a bunch of neat craft and pottery shops. I bought a purse made out of a coconut that my littlee daughter carried for years (until another kid purposely broke it, making my daughter very sad- she still recalls that event to this day!). I recall having a very enjoyable, multicourse, and inexpensive sidewalk seafood lunch there.
I told my husband that the cruise was OK, but if we ever went back, I’d prefer to just visit this town.
This website was very helpful when I first started thinking about visiting-