Home Last updated 04 June 2009
Mexican Tours and Agencies In Maya Areas
Generally speaking, you can do everything that a tour does much cheaper by yourself. If you must deal with a company for day trips, I recommend generally looking at what is available ahead of time and booking when you get there, in case there may be cheaper alternatives. On the other hand, for longer excursions, you will want to be sure something is set up in advance. Then go for it.
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Some Yucatan Region Area Birding Guides
Agencies and Guides
Calakmul See Xpujil
Eco Paraiso does a lot of tours, including Celestún, Uxmal and off-shore fishing.
Cancún AGI Tours is locally owned and has a lot of tours available. Eco-travel Mexico has a lot of higher end tours, including some bike rides. A price quoted in June, 2003 for a 9 day ride in Yucatán was $1200 US double occupancy , but you won't find online prices. Explorecancun.com has some nice pictures. some with e-mail. Maya World Tours has some 8 day tours of the area that aren't terribly expensive. Although they have a Cancun office, theirs is a Cocos Island web address. As of 20 Jan. 2004, they seem to have lifted some of Mike Reed's descriptions wholesale from either this site or that of Mexconnect.com. I wonder about their ethics. Venture Out. This place has a good selection of day and overnight trips to Cobá and, Valladolid, Río Lagartos and other places. If you want to see Calakmul as a three day trip, this might be the one for you.
Celestún Ecoparaiso offers some interesting but costly tours of Celestún Inlet and the region.
Chiapas Do it yourself tour idea for Yaxchilán and Bonampak Xanav Tours (kind of expensive and fond of capital letters) xxxThis "River of Ruins Tour" down the Usumacinta sounds interesting and affordable, except that they merely go past the ruins of Piedras Negras. Sure, there is not a whole lot to see, but I don't know if I could take going past that ruin without stopping.
If you speak Spanish, you could arrange trips to Yaxchilán and Piedras Negras from Frontera Corazal with the Escudo Jaguar cooperative, but you can easily join with others when there to share a boat and the boat ride to Piedras Negras from Corozal is 4 hours one way and expensive.
You can get to Piedras Negras easier as a day trip or an overnighter from Palenque, whichever you prefer. Call Willy Fonseca
Chetumal
Cozumel Area Travel Inc. has tours from Cozumel to Isla Mujeres, Xel Ha and Tulum and elsewhere.IMC includes short mainland tours of Chichén Itzá, Uxmal, Mérida and Tikal, Guatemala.Orbitur see Playa del Carmen
Mundaca Travel has trips to Chichén Itzá, Mérida and farther away. It also has some local snorkel trips. At present, they are offline.
Izamal None listed
Ecoturlacandona.com lists Lacandón local operations in Spanish. Some are well off the beaten path.
Eco-Tourism Yucatan has a number of tours, and their van -bicycle day trip looks interesting, but a bit pricey. Note that they do not list their prices; you will need to e-mail them. Nómadas Hostel and Tour Agency. This outfit sounds pricey at $65 a day for a bike trip where you often camp, but breakfasts are included. Bikes are extra, though. There is a 12 day Puuc area tour and 21 days doing that and heading toward Cancun via Chichén Itzá. Orbitur lists no prices at all, but looks interesting.
STP is in Spanish and has the normal tours listed, but without prices. However, if you want to see Bonampák and Yaxchilán see this page. If you want to head to Flores and Tikal see this one. Turistica Maya Chiapas lists no prices, but does the usual trips and ones to Flores with visits to Yaxchilán and Bonampak along the way. It also lists a two day that includes jungle hiking with a Lacandón guide. Some bargaining may be a good idea when arranging with them. I got an otherwise good report about them, but others along had paid less.
Puerto Morelos Goyo's Jungle Adventures lists several jungle trips that look interesting, but you might also check around town for other cheaper options. Dive Puerto Morelos also does fishing and tours
Playa del Carmen ATV Explorer. This involves a noisy jungle ATV ride with others punctuated with swimming in a cenote and visiting a cave. Aerosaab offers flights and tours, which include a half day trip to Chichén Itzá, and visits to Cobá/Tulum and Isla Holbox. Their route map indicates that they will also fly to Palenque Altournative offers Maya village tours with jungle, Cobá, cenotes and more. Caribbean Coast Travel. Tours to Chichén, Cobá and Tulum. Funky Tours, These people offer tours in three levels of comfort that aren't very expensive, especially the basic one that involves sleeping in a hammock. This company covers Maya Central America. See this page for departures They mention an day trip to Tikal, but I could not access that page. If you will be at Playa or Cozumel and want to give them a try, email them. Playa del Carmen Tours offers no day trips to ruins, but has a day trip by ferry to Isla Mujeres and a trip to Isla Contoy.
Los Pingüinos runs affordable bike trips. Explora does some interesting raft trips and answers price questions in pesos. However, I am not showing their web address and I suggest that others beware of dealing with them. See my experience.
Tuxtla Gutierrez Maya Kaab has a number of tours in Chiapas, but no prices listed.
XTC Dive Center does fishing dives and snorkel trips
Servidores Turísticos Calakmul has a camping area near Calakmul and an office inside Xpujil. It has no website, but if you have a group, this can be a good option for seeing a lot of local ruins. Fernando doesn't mind if you add others you meet in Xpujil to your group and he has a large van. The price for a standard day trip from Xpujil is $160 US for the vehicle and driver.
Owners are Fernando Sastre and Leticia Valenzuela. ciitcalakmul@prodigy.net.mx If you speak Spanish, you can also call 983 871 6064
Rio Bec Dreams claims to run tours in the Xpujil area, but in 2008, the person there just stopped responding without explanation, so for my 2009 Rio Bec area day trips, I had to make other arrangements. Never look here for that website.
Villahermosa Travel Agencies (scroll down a bit)
If you feel the need to arrange something before leaving and are into saving money, you might look at Funky Tours. Bike Mexico also has some relatively inexpensive bike tours in the Yucatán area and the staff is quite helpful.
Need more travel related info? Research there and then ask questions at Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree for Mexico.
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Experiences with Explora, a Tour Company in Chiapas, Mexico
In 2003,
I flew into Villahermosa and later out of Belize City. In the early stage of my
journey, I became very displeased with Explora, a company based in San Cristobal,
which has a camp near Lacanha Chansayab, the Lacandón village. They offer a
number of day trips and overnighters, but I was mostly interested in the rafting
trip along the Lacanhá River to within a 40 minute walk to Bonampak. I showed up
without companions and ready to pay for the minimum two passengers, but the
fellow told me that it was too late in the day to start.
Instead, I went to the Lacanhá ruins in the company of a Lacandón guide, Na K'in.
She was quite interesting to me, since she is the daughter of Obregon Chan K'in.
She is also the niece of Margarita Na K'in, who had been the girlfriend of the
doomed adventurer, Carlos Frey, and I found that she had moved off to Sayaxche
after his death.
The ruins are not huge, being several several standing buildings in two
locations, but it involves a pleasant walk in jungle. The hike also includes a
swim below a waterfall on the Río Cedro, which is a place that approaches being
an Eden.
Pleasant hike and delightful swim over, I stated that I might be back the next
day if a group did not appear for a day trip to Piedras Negras. The group did
not appear, so I returned to the Explora campamento at an earlier hour. However,
this time the fellow stated that a second passenger was needed, because the
sluggishness of the river requires that much paddling. He could have mentioned
that the day before, but had not bothered to do so.
Explora is not all that easy to get to. If you are on the road at the airport
facing toward the village, you would turn left and hike one kilometer to reach
it and trudge back unhappily after being disappointed. If you want to see
Lacanhá
and swim in the river, a guide would be recommended, but I suspect that you
could find one in the village. Another possibility would be to go to Na K'in's
tienda, which is right before the Explora camp and deal with her directly.
I do not recommend Explora one bit. Their website is surprisingly hard to find
with a google search and I think that is a good
thing for unsuspecting travelers. Their campground looks okay, but you are more
likely to meet other travelers by staying at one of the campgrounds past the
village.