ruins from belize and costa maya

[edariano]

We have booked a cruise to cozumel, grand caymen, belize, costa maya, tampa in march 2018.  We are trying to figure out the best ports and excursions for seeing ruins.  any suggestions would be great!  We have been to cozumel and caymen in the past and will likely do more of a beach day in those ports, but any recommendations would be great!

 

Also if anyone has done a  private journey's excursion in this area, we would consider that as well

[PRC]

TheNativeChoice, in Costa Maya is great.  Run by 2 locals (Ivan and David...we had David as out guide), we had a fantastic time.

 

 

 

[Guest toodle68]

On our last cruise, I wanted 1 excursion to be to a Mayan ruin and researched every tour for the 3 ports. In the end I picked the river safari in Belize. Most of the others were several hours of hell..  the river safari was an hour on a bus, a hour in a speed boat to the ruins.. then an hour back on the boat. A nice lunch at the change over point and back on the bus.  I found the bus ride out to go quickly as the tour guide told us about Belize and the ride back went quickly as I looked over the landscape / people / buildings etc..

[Matt]

I've heard the Mayan ruins in Belize are supposed to be pretty good

[mom2mybugs]

I thought the mayan ruins in costa maya were great.   It was a long bus,  but not insane, and we still had some beach time and "hair braiding" time before sailing.   Jane

[Matt]

12 hours ago, mom2mybugs said:

I thought the mayan ruins in costa maya were great.   It was a long bus,  but not insane, and we still had some beach time and "hair braiding" time before sailing.   Jane

I'd like to try those when we go in February when we go to Belize.

[DocLC]

19 hours ago, mom2mybugs said:

I thought the mayan ruins in costa maya were great.   It was a long bus,  but not insane, and we still had some beach time and "hair braiding" time before sailing.   Jane

I really liked them too.  I liked Tulum, too, but it seemed that the Costa Maya ruins were more expansive and didn't seem to take as long to get there as it does from Cozumel to Tulum with the ferry and bus ride both ways.

[bcarney]

On 4/22/2017 at 5:45 PM, DocLC said:

I really liked them too.  I liked Tulum, too, but it seemed that the Costa Maya ruins were more expansive and didn't seem to take as long to get there as it does from Cozumel to Tulum with the ferry and bus ride both ways.

And now we know why the Mayan civilization disappeared - it was too far away from the cruise ports.

[cruise-y]

On April 21, 2017 at 7:51 AM, toodle68 said:

On our last cruise, I wanted 1 excursion to be to a Mayan ruin and researched every tour for the 3 ports. In the end I picked the river safari in Belize. Most of the others were several hours of hell..  the river safari was an hour on a bus, a hour in a speed boat to the ruins.. then an hour back on the boat. A nice lunch at the change over point and back on the bus.  I found the bus ride out to go quickly as the tour guide told us about Belize and the ride back went quickly as I looked over the landscape / people / buildings etc..

I totally agree with this.  I've been to lots of Mayan ruins and this excursion to Lamanai was really fun.  The bus ride isn't too long, you get to take a river boat ride into the interior and there is a very nice Belizian lunch at an outdoor patio right by the river.  You hike a bit into the jungle to see the ruins, which I also liked a lot, but some may not.

With that said, Chicen Itza is by far the most impressive and superior to all, but it is a tender ride and then a very, very long bus ride from the Cozumel cruise port.  I think you eat a box lunch on the bus to save time.   It should be seen, but probably not on a cruise.