We’re thinking of taking a vacation somewhere along the tropical Mexican coast. We haven’t settled yet on whether it’ll be the east or west coast, let alone which city or resort to visit, but we’ll probably be looking for some sort of all-inclusive deal.
From what I’ve read about the resorts, it seems that there’s plenty of things to do, different restaurants at which to eat, and so on, but the thing I’m wondering about is the weather and climate. I know late summer and fall is hurricane and typhoon season, which actually doesn’t worry me too much since most storms tend to be fairly random, local affairs. On the other hand what does worry me is flying all the way down there, and then experiencing a week of blah overcast weather. Do the Mexican coastlines have a “June Gloom” phenomenon every year the way Southern California does? And how likely are hurricanes? Should we not even consider going between August and December?
Hurricane season can means wet weather. If you want to hang around in a hotel room for a week, you can do it without springing for plane fare!
Any website will tell you the high and low seasons. The “low” season for tourists means when the weather is crappy. That’s why it’s cheaper and no one want to go then.
We had a lovely time in August, South of Cancun. The midday weather was hot, but we sat in the pool or indoors with a book. Mornings and evenings were cooler (you still want to make sure you have air conditioning!) Rained nearly every day mid afternoon, usually pretty hard, but not for long. However, we missed one hurricane by three weeks, and the next by six - which means we were in an area that had hurricane damage - I’m sure its prettier when they aren’t busy cleaning up. (Are they ever busy in Mexico? - when we got there, it looked damaged. Every day it looked a little less damaged and things were definately getting done - by the end of the week it was looking much better, but we never saw anyone do anything other than sit by the side of the road.)
Thanks for the input everyone. Specifically, we’re thinking of spending about three days in Mexico City, and then four or five days at one of the resorts. It seems like that itinerary would give us the best of two types of vacations…history and culture as well as lounging on a beach. Though I’m looking forward to trying some of the active pastimes down there too, like snorkeling and boardsailing, so it won’t all be just sitting around.
On the Pacific side the best time is from the beginning of December until the beginning of June. You are almost guaranteed beautiful blue skies. It starts to rain in June. More rain in July and the wettest months are August and Sept. October is hit or miss but generally hot and humid. November is usually good but sometimes gets some late season rains.