Staying in Tikal

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Some Thoughts About Getting to and Staying at Tikal

Info about shuttle hours from Chetumal to Flores and vice versa.

Do you really need a guide?      

Do you need a reservation? 

Seeing Uaxactún from Tikal  

 

To get there by air, there are two airlines,  TACA, see the flight schedules between Guate, Flores and Cancun.

TAG flies between Guate and Flores and to Copan.

 

By aging deluxe buses, Linea Dorada runs Tikal Mayan World, which runs them to and from Flores to Belize and to Chetumal, Mexico.  It looks like you could book online if you need to. Take the reference to bar and food with a grain of salt. BYO adult beverages and food consisted of soda and a sandwich on the overnighter I was on. Autobuses del Norte runs regular deluxe class buses between Guate and Flores, including a night one and gets good reviews.

Fuente del Norte also runs some first class buses with a few deluxe seats between Guatemala and Flores.

 

In a large number of visits to Petén, I normally also have gone back to Tikal. My reasons include the fact that there is always reconstruction going on, so I want to see how it is going.  I have stayed in the Park itself twice and once spent the night in Uaxactún, but I generally prefer the lights of Flores and seeing the sun go down over the lake there.

 

Getting There from Flores

 

Minivans

People offering rides to Tikal meet every plane and first class bus to Santa Elena/Flores that I am aware of. If you are planning to have a pleasant stay in Flores instead, any hotel you stay in or agency you run across can then arrange a shuttle for you.

 

Chicken Buses

 Asociación de Transportes runs buses between Santa Elena and Tikal, leaving the bus station at 6:00 AM, 6:30, 7:00, 8:30, 10:00, 11:30,  and 12:30 PM for 20Q.  There are also buses to Tikal  and Uaxactún at 1300 and 1500.      

 

 Lodging

The park lodging at Tikal is quite overpriced for what little you get, and my understanding is that because the hotels are geared toward tour groups, there is some chance of single reservations disappearing.  If you either fly or bus in and arrive early in the morning, one approach could be to hop into one of the vans and go straight to Tikal with your pack. Then you can leave your pack at the Visitors' Center for a small fee. By the end of the day, you should have a very good idea whether you really need another day there or not. Then you could decide whether to spend a night there, to head up to Uaxactún for the night or to just go back to Flores.  

  • The Jungle Lodge probably still has some small, darker and cheaper rooms, along with the regular ones. 

  • The Jaguar Inn has camping on its grounds and some hammocks you can rent, which are already up, so you can look at them to decide if you want to use one. These are first come; first served. Room reservations made by e-mail without a deposit are held until noon of the arrival day. There is a 10% surcharge on credit cards, so bring cash or traveler's checks. 

  • Tikal Inn has direct e-mail that works for reservations and info.

Advantages of Staying at Tikal.

 

Disadvantages to Staying in Tikal Park

  • There is no nightlife or much to do there at night.  Be sure to have a flashlight available in case you want to wander over to one of the comedors or even one of  the hotel restaurants for a beer. I think that the best idea is a headlamp you can wear as if you were a miner. It makes ordinary things like reading, holding a beer or almost anything else much simpler in the dark than using a hand held item for light. 

  • The hotels have you paying a lot for relatively little in comfort.

  • Hotel generators do not run all night, so expect that that pleasant overhead fan will go dead at some point around 10 PM. On a very hot night, this can be a bit unpleasant.

  • Food is very expensive and hotel food is only so so. Whatever you do, don't become a captive audience of your hotel by including meals in the price. Eat at the comedors.

 

Also see my favorite comedor at Tikal

 

 

 

What if you don't have a reservation at Tikal and you want to stay the night?

Even if you had a reservation at one of the park hotels, it would still be possible that you would show up and find that a tour had come in and you were somehow forgotten. If you do show up without a reservation or merely find out that you don't have one, I think that the first order of business is to see this fascinating Maya ruin site. You can at a last resort, merely head back and spend a very pleasant evening in Flores. There will be no lack of vans leaving for Flores until late in the afternoon. You can simply leave your locked pack in the store room at the Tourist Information Center until you are ready to pick it up.

The small charge should still be 1 quetzal an hour per pack.
 


                                                                                                                  Do you need a guide at Tikal?
Tikal guides are generally very entertaining and are very good at giving the impression of knowing about the Maya. There might be a good one there, but it's hard to say. A really popular one named Cesar thought that Maya warriors wore salt as part of their armor. One with e-mail named Francisco sounded good, but never responded to a follow-up question. Someone local whom I consider to be knowledgeable, though a bit cynical, says that there is only one very good Tikal guide, and you would have to arrange for her services elsewhere.

 

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