Our Flawed Overnight Trip to Tulum National Park

We are excited to be in the Yucatan state of Mexico, in part, for all of the Mayan archaeological sites that you can visit. We whetted our appetites for Mayan ruins during our trip to Tikal National Park in northern Guatemala, and were eager to see more! But we went to South America soon afterward and knew we would have to wait to get back to Mayan territory.

Now that we are back and have our day-to-day lives in Mérida figured out, we wanted to explore a bunch of archaeological sites while we had time. And visiting Tulum National Park on the southeastern Yucatan coast was high on the list!

But our trip to Tulum, although enjoyable, didn’t exactly work out as planned.

The Appeal of Tulum National Park

Tulum National Park is made up of 3 major areas: the coastal archaeological site, the beaches, and the jungle.

But practically speaking, you only can really explore the archaeological site and beaches due to a lack of footpaths.

Archeologists suggest that the Tulum settlement was a significant Mayan city during the 13th and 14th centuries. Its strategic position between adjacent provinces, and its elevated coastal port location, made it unavoidable for commercial routes. Tulum functioned independently of the domain of other provinces, until the arrival of the Spanish in the 16th century, when it was abandoned.

Tulum is the only Mayan settlement overlooking the Caribbean, which is why so many Instagrammers love the place!

And the singularly unique views made Tulum a must-visit for us too!

A Portent of Doom

Our friends and occasional travel partners, Krista and Rich, warned us that we needed to make sure that Tulum was, in fact, open when we planned our visit.

When they visited Tulum as part of a travel excursion, they were denied entry to the actual archeological site because there was restorative construction going on.

We wanted to make certain that this would not happen to us, so we checked the official Tulum Archaeological Site webpage (as well as doing the usual Google research) before we booked our own Tulum trip.

There were no closures indicated on their website (it is normally open 7 days per week), so we locked in our bus tickets and hotel so we could visit the town and archeological site.

Getting To and From Tulum

This was easy.

Our Airbnb is only about 10 blocks away from the ADO Centro Historico bus terminal, so we booked round-trip tickets online between Mérida and Tulum for a November 27 (departure) and a November 28 (return).

Cost = $1,433 MEX/$83.18 USD for two tickets.

The ride takes about 5 hours, one way.

Our Plan to Conquer Tulum National Park

We planned to arrive at Tulum in the late afternoon. We would then head to the main downtown tourist area, explore, and afterward hang out at our “hotel” for the night.

The next day we would wake up at the crack of dawn and visit Tulum National Park when it opened at 8 am. We’d explore the archaeological site and beaches for a couple of hours (widely reported as plenty of time), and then return to our hotel, grab some food, rest, and then catch our return bus to Mérida in the late afternoon.

Arrival Day – All Is Well

Our bus ride to Tulum went off without a hitch, and we arrived at noon on Monday, November 27 without any problems.

We were prepared for this, but my God, the town of Tulum is a tourist trap of epic proportions!

Anything not sold in a supermarket or convenience store had an astronomical markup anywhere near the central artery of the town.

Thankfully we had leads on several food places, but they were still more expensive than we would have liked.

For lunch, we went to Taqueria Honorio an outstanding taqueria. Taco prices range from $28 – $40 MEX ($1.63 – $2.33 USD) depending on ingredients. The tacos were super-high quality! But as a point of reference, you can get good tacos for around $17 MEX each in Mérida.

That said, this place was still a bargain compared to most for lunch, considering the quality.

We got 5 tacos and a torta (sandwich), with bottled water and watermelon juice for $299.20 MEX ($17.48 USD), including tip.

The food was really good!

And we were happy with our “hotel” as well.

We stayed in a yurt!

Specifically, we booked a Black Friday deal through Booking.com at Huaya Camp, which borders the more local-oriented side of town.

And we got a sweet deal, getting 70% off the normal room rate.

Cost = $36.23 USD for 1 night.

Huaya Camp is a “retreat” of sorts, offering massages, cacao ceremonies, drum circles, and other “meditative offerings”. And despite being located in such a busy town, the property was filled with trees and lush greenery to give you the illusion you weren’t in oppressive urban sprawl.

The facility was lovely, as were the attendants, who went out of their way to be helpful.

Here are some pictures of our yurt.

And here is a photo of the pool, which we took full advantage of.

It was a great place to relax on a hot day.

By dinnertime we were pretty tired, so we ate at a nearby burrito place.

We went to Burrito Amor, which specializes in more upscale burrito options. We both got two excellent pork and pineapple burritos, with a chaya smoothie and lime-cucumber drink for $432 MEX ($25.24 USD), including tip. The burritos were $135 MEX ($7.85 USD) each.

Not bad by USA cost standards.

But keep in mind that in Mérida you can get a burrito twice the size, with additional sides, for $45 MEX less! Still, we think we did pretty well for Tulum.

Our Morning at Tulum National Park

We woke up bright and early in the morning to get to Tulum National Park by 8 am.

It was about a 2.7 mile (4.3 km) walk from our hotel to get there.

Since we were cooped up in a bus for most of the previous day and would be again later today, the walk was something to look forward to!

Unfortunately, when we arrived at the entrance, there was a small line of people all being told the same thing:

Although the park was open, the archaeological site was closed to visitors for repair.

[Insert expletive here]

The six people in line were all irritated, but perhaps less so than us since we specifically researched to make sure that this wouldn’t happen!

Alas, there was nothing we could do so we made the best of things.

We went to the ticket office to buy entry into the park so we could at least enjoy the beaches. Park tickets were very reasonable at $115.74 MEX ($6.75 USD) for two. If the archaeological site were open, we would have had to pay an additional $90 MEX per ticket.

We then made the long walk through the park along a paved road, which connected to the bottom of Playa Paraiso. We then walked up the shoreline enjoying the relative solitude with very few tourists at that hour.

The beaches were nearly deserted and were gorgeous.

But as a bonus, when we reached the north end of Playa Paraiso, we spied the ruins of Tulum on a distant cliff.

At least we can honestly say we saw the ruins. 😉

By the time we were done visiting Tulum National Park there was a HUGE line of cars and people waiting to get in at the entrance.

And they were all being told the same bad news we were: no entry to the ruins due to construction.

Needless to say, there were a lot of unhappy people.

When we got back to our yurt at 11 am, we were pretty exhausted! We put in over 10 miles of walking at that point.

We then showered off, got an hour’s rest in our yurt, checked out, and left for lunch and coffee. There were 4 hours between our required noon checkout and bus departure, so we had time to kill.

We first went to a nondescript local cafe for 2 cortados and 1 cappuccino ($245 MEX/$14.30 USD total) and hung out for an hour or so, avoiding the intermittent rain.

We then went to Tropi Tacos to see if we could find some good, cheap tacos.

Rhonda and I got their 5 Tacos del Pastor special for $75 MEX ($4.34 USD) per person. A solid deal cost-wise, but their tacos weren’t as flavorful as those from the day before. But they didn’t skimp on taco fillings, so at least our bellies were full!

Afterward, we hung out at the local park in the shade, then headed to the bus station for our 4:30 pm departure.

Thankfully the bus arrived on time and the ride back to Mérida went without any problems.

Closing Thoughts on Our Trip To Tulum

It was a bummer that we couldn’t see the Tulum site the way we had intended, but we made lemons out of lemonade.

Visiting the archaeological site is more about enjoying the view of ancient temples overlooking the ocean, rather than exploring an expansive complex. Most people say you can explore all of the Tulum ruins in under an hour! So it wasn’t that we missed seeing a site of extreme archaeological significance, aside from its location.

But still, it would have been nice to visit properly.

When we returned to Mérida, we checked again with the Tulum National Park website to see if we somehow missed a notice that the park was scheduled to be closed. And the first thing that showed up on the site was a big pop-up message stating that the park would be closed on November 27, 28, and 29 for renovations.

Ugh.

Wish this had been posted before we booked our trip!

C’est la vie.

Until next time…

Thanks for reading!

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