Really good experience with Native Choice

[baileybrad]

We used this touring company on our December 21, 2016, stop in Costa Maya. Unfortunately, I procrastinated and when I finally booked on Tuesday, December 12th, 6 days before our departure....the tours Mayan Experience and the Extreme visit to the freshwater lake only had a couple of seats left. So we did the Mayan Ruins tour @ Chacchoben.

 

That is what I get for not having my act together. It was $55 for wife, myself and our 2 teenage sons and $45 for the twelve year old--total of $265 to our Visa on their website.

 

Our stop was a pain in that it did not arrive until noon and left at 7:00PM (with the shorter winter day, 7:00PM bought us nothing at this stop.

 

We walked out of the port area, proceeded past the taxi area and took the 1st cross street that we came to Paseo del Puerto and then walked about 2 blocks on that street. They provide a map on the confirmation. It is about a 10 minute walk once you are outside the cruise gate. Not much around. Easy peasy. The office is located on the left side of the street. You cannot miss it....there is nothing else around. It is very new looking. When we walked up outside....a gentleman gave us all an ice cold bottle of water. Checking in was a breeze. We had to wait about 10 minutes for our bus to pull up. In the meantime, a couple of smaller vans pulled away for, I am assuming, different tours. This appears to be a very well run/professional business.

 

Because I booked late, we wound up on a larger touring bus but we only had about 20 or so folks on the tour. The bus looked brand new. Our tour guide, David, was amazing. So full of knowledge. As others have described, about a 50 minute drive to the ruins. Spent about 1 1/2 hours there and then the return trip. David, gave our group the name of "Survivors" so when he needed us to gather or prepare to move on....it was easy to do so. There was lots of traffic in the parking lot but we did not find the tour areas to be all that crowded....that was with 3 ships in this tiny port. David wowed us with knowledge and facts about what we were seeing. Quite an amazing guy, we spoke privately with him and he explained that he was an art major who went from being a school teacher to a tour guide, mainly because of the ability to earn a better living. He is from this area and is very proud of his heritage. He made the tour for us.

 

This is a very poor area....you pass very little on the drive to and from the Ruins.

 

We were dropped off outside the port entrance area and arrived back in plenty of time to do some visiting of the shops in the port area. Kids bought their shot glasses and I believe my wife bought a magnet. Couple of notes that just came to mind.....water was available on our bus, it was not a very hot day, and due to the season.....no biting bugs.

 

I am glad that we were able to see these ruins. While not as expansive or unearthed as some others in the area...it was very easy to get to these time-wise and with David as our guide we received an amazing experience.

Edited December 28, 2016 by baileybrad

[DisneyDatknee]

Thank you for the review. We are booking this tour!!!

 

 

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[puschi1906]

Thank you for this review, we take the same tour in March. Now I am really looking forward to visiting the ruins. We have never seen Mayan ruins before but we don't want a tour that includes sitting on a bus for several hours.

Edited January 18, 2017 by puschi1906

[maldenmusic]

We did this tour on Dec. 22 and also had David as our guide. We had a wonderful time.