Mayan Ruins

[CaityMarie]

Hi, we are going to be traveling on the Carnival Magic from November 11th to the 18th. We will be visiting Cozumel, Belize City, Mahogany Bay and Costa Maya. My question is which port would it be best to do an excursion to see the Mayan Ruins? I don't want to miss out on this awesome opportunity, but I also want to make sure I have fun. This is my first cruise & my first time leaving the country (other than to Victoria, B.C which is a ferry ride away). I also am afraid of paying a lot for an excursion and it being less than awesome.

 

Thank you for your input! [emoji2]

 

Caity

[easyboy]

Depends which Mayan ruins you want to see. We did the shore excursion on the Mayan ruins of Altun Ha from Belize.

[Marywillowhill]

Xunatunich ruins in Belize are spectacular. They are far from the port. After much research here we did a Carnival excursion to them. Check out the Belize board. You can climb the steps to the top. It's a workout , but worth it!

[psk2347]

We decided based upon the excursion that took the least amount of time. There is one in Belize that is a 4 hour - 5 hour excursion, it was amazing! If I recall correctly all the other Mayan excursions had a two and a half hour bus ride, 30 minute hike through the woods, 30 minutes at the ruins, 30 minutes for lunch, 30 minute hike back, and another two and a half hour trip back to port. We didnt want to spend 8 hours of our day on one excursion that only provided 30 minutes of enjoyment.

[whaletaillover]

I second the Xunantunich ruins tour in Belize,we went on this one this past Oct,and it was great.The bus ride was long but well worth it as the ruins are spectacular.The guides are very informative and pretty funny.The included lunch was very good also.

[mishka422]

I did the carnival excursion to Altun Ha. It was very good and not to terribly long a bus ride. The guide talked all the way there giving all sorts of information about the country. The year we did it, it was a combination tour that included the river Wallace. We took a boat from a launch all the help way back to the port. We saw howler monkeys, bats, manatees, a crocodile, and lots of locals going about their daily lives living on the river. Really fun!

 

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[bakersdozen12]

We did the Coba Mayan pyramids via Cozumel and it was amazing. It has the only pyramid in Mexico that you can still climb to the top of. I highly recommend it. You can read a review of it in my review from the Dream cruise I took in 2015 (link is in signature).

 

 

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[crewsweeper]

There are no Mayan Ruin sin Roatan (Mahogany Bay).

 

Ruins in Cozumel are small. Trip to Tulum, which is very scenic but small late era city and you are restricted to guided pathways, is very long for the amount of time you spend there.

 

In Belize, Altun Ha is closer by, fully excavated easily walked, lower cost to do this via private vendor. Xunantunich as others have mentioned is a good set of ruins to visit, with great views from the top of the temple. Lamanai, is a river/bus trip and long walk through jungle to partially excavated ruins but distance leaves you with very little time to explore.

 

In Costa Maya, if you do a private excursion with Native Choice, you will get a more immersed sense of lower Yucatan Mayan culture and first class guides. Outside of the beach or the boring overpriced cruise port, it's about your only option in Costa Maya. But reconsider doing ruins here if you have an early afternoon departure from CM.

[cruzeluver]

We were on your same itinerary on Magic last week.

 

We booked the Lamanai ruins excursion through Carnival based on its nearly perfect five star rating and I have to say it lived up to the hype. The bus ride was maybe an hour and fifteen minutes but it flew by as our guide did such a great job of engaging with everyone and providing a lot of great information on the history of Belize and sharing his pride in his beautiful country. The speedboat trip up the river was quite a thrill! Took may be 15 minutes. The walking once you arrive at Lamanai was fairly easy and mostly on flat surfaces. The grounds are absolutely gorgeous and the temples very impressive. The guides at the site were terrific. You have the option to climb the high temple and I recommend you do if you can. After the speedboat ride back we were served a very good lunch of chicken, beans and rice, potato salad and plantains. This was a bucket list type of experience and I am so glad we did it!

[notes21]

The Altun Ha ruins are some that you may have learned about in a humanities class at some point as large amounts of jade were found there. (I've taught humanities, so these were the ones I really wanted to see). It is not a terribly long drive though it can be bumpy, and it is a pretty easy walk around the ruins. You can still climb to the top of one of the temples there, and it provides an absolutely gorgeous view. We really enjoyed our trip there and did not feel rushed either at the site or upon return to the port.

[Mary Ellen1]

I did the carnival excursion to Altun Ha. It was very good and not to terribly long a bus ride. The guide talked all the way there giving all sorts of information about the country. The year we did it, it was a combination tour that included the river Wallace. We took a boat from a launch all the help way back to the port. We saw howler monkeys, bats, manatees, a crocodile, and lots of locals going about their daily lives living on the river. Really fun!

 

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This.

 

I've visited Mayan ruins in three of the ports you mention, and, if it's your first trip, I'd definitely recommend this one. It's almost like two excursions in one, because you see the ruins, but you also get the boat ride down the river, and see all the amazing wildlife. I think it's called Altun Ha and River Wallace, or something like that. Depending on what group they put you in, you'll either go to the ruins first (by bus), ad then take the boat back, or do it the other way around. Highly recommend!

[InitialD]

With so many other things to do at the other ports I would say Belize is usually best for Mayan ruins unless you want to go cave tubing or scuba diving in that port.

[krehberg]

IMO, Belize is the port to visit the ruins. I've done both Xunantunich and Altun Ha and can recommend both...but no doubt the Xunantunich ruins are more impressive.

[ABQrobin]

Belize.....Xunantunich.

[CaityMarie]

This.

 

I've visited Mayan ruins in three of the ports you mention, and, if it's your first trip, I'd definitely recommend this one. It's almost like two excursions in one, because you see the ruins, but you also get the boat ride down the river, and see all the amazing wildlife. I think it's called Altun Ha and River Wallace, or something like that. Depending on what group they put you in, you'll either go to the ruins first (by bus), ad then take the boat back, or do it the other way around. Highly recommend!

This one sounds fun. Although I have to be careful about being near the rivers due to being allergic to mosquitoes.

We did the Coba Mayan pyramids via Cozumel and it was amazing. It has the only pyramid in Mexico that you can still climb to the top of. I highly recommend it. You can read a review of it in my review from the Dream cruise I took in 2015 (link is in signature).

 

 

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There are no Mayan Ruin sin Roatan (Mahogany Bay).

 

Ruins in Cozumel are small. Trip to Tulum, which is very scenic but small late era city and you are restricted to guided pathways, is very long for the amount of time you spend there.

 

In Belize, Altun Ha is closer by, fully excavated easily walked, lower cost to do this via private vendor. Xunantunich as others have mentioned is a good set of ruins to visit, with great views from the top of the temple. Lamanai, is a river/bus trip and long walk through jungle to partially excavated ruins but distance leaves you with very little time to explore.

 

In Costa Maya, if you do a private excursion with Native Choice, you will get a more immersed sense of lower Yucatan Mayan culture and first class guides. Outside of the beach or the boring overpriced cruise port, it's about your only option in Costa Maya. But reconsider doing ruins here if you have an early afternoon departure from CM.

 

 

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[beckatron]

We were on your same itinerary on Magic last week.

 

We booked the Lamanai ruins excursion through Carnival based on its nearly perfect five star rating and I have to say it lived up to the hype. The bus ride was maybe an hour and fifteen minutes but it flew by as our guide did such a great job of engaging with everyone and providing a lot of great information on the history of Belize and sharing his pride in his beautiful country. The speedboat trip up the river was quite a thrill! Took may be 15 minutes. The walking once you arrive at Lamanai was fairly easy and mostly on flat surfaces. The grounds are absolutely gorgeous and the temples very impressive. The guides at the site were terrific. You have the option to climb the high temple and I recommend you do if you can. After the speedboat ride back we were served a very good lunch of chicken, beans and rice, potato salad and plantains. This was a bucket list type of experience and I am so glad we did it!

 

 

This is good to hear. My husband saw some ruins in Costa Maya about a decade ago and he loved it - still talks about it. We are on the Dream in June to celebrate our 20th anniversary and I booked the Lamani ruins as our excursion and I am really hoping he will like it. It does get really good reviews.

[originalgeek]

I can only speak to the one we did which was Tulum and Beach club from Cozumel - the ruins are on the mainland so it's a ferry ride from Cozumel dock and then a bus ride up to the ancient city of Tulum. I thought it was beautiful and we enjoyed our time there but there was definitely a lot of walking and ground to cover. Our guide was very informative and entertaining and made sure we all kept together. Lots of great photo ops and a souvenir shopping village where the buses park. Take advantage of the frozen water bottles for sale on the way in - lasted me a good long while and very much appreciated that I had a drink during the tour.

 

Our excursion also stopped at a beach club on the way back where we had buffet lunch with beer/soda included. It was a pretty beach with lots of chairs and shade and the food was pretty good and the beer was plentiful. I love trying local beers in places I've never been.

 

This excursion takes all day and there's no time to do anything in Cozumel but it was worth it to us. We'll go back to these places again I'm sure - I want to visit all the ruins in Belize mentioned up-thread.

[Luke Dawg]

Hi, we did Tulum with CCL from Cozumel. I does take the entire time you are in port. It was very interesting the the guide Pamela was great and passionate about the history. The only draw back is the ferry from Cozumel to Playa del Carmen, it was a rough ride. I have read there are times it is a smooth ride, chance you take.

[crossfitmama]

I would also have to mention Lamanai in Belize as it was amazing!!! Getting there was incredible. You go by boat down this river and its really and adventure in itself. The ruins are spectacular. Haven't been to Xunantunich so can't compare but we really loved this trip. We saw howler monkeys at the ruins and got to climb to the top of the temple. https://belizecruiseexcursions.com/excursion/lamanai-belize-excursion-mayan-ruins/

[summersigh]

Depends which Mayan ruins you want to see. We did the shore excursion on the Mayan ruins of Altun Ha from Belize.

We did one here in Belize as well.

 

We picked the one with the boat ride down River Wallace first, then stopped for authentic lunch (you purchase this) then board a bus for the Altun Ha ruins. We were actually allowed to climb to the top of the largest building which was totally impressive in my mind.

 

Excellent day in our opinion. :)

[nybumpkin]

We went to Altun Ha in Belize with the Carnival excursion that includes the boat trip on the River Wallace. It's an excellent tour - aside from the ruins we saw a fair amount of wildlife along the river. We also visited the Chacchoben ruins with The Native Choice when in Costa Maya. Chacchoben is about an hour away from Costa Maya. The excursion we booked included a tour of the ruins (David and Ivan, the owners of The Native Choice, are local) and lunch with a Mayan family in the modern-day village of Chacchoben. Both are long days, but very worthwhile.

[sjcruiser]

I agree!! We've done both, and Xunantunich was better.

 

IMO, Belize is the port to visit the ruins. I've done both Xunantunich and Altun Ha and can recommend both...but no doubt the Xunantunich ruins are more impressive.

[CaityMarie]

Thank you for everyone's input!

 

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[TXchic]

There are no Mayan Ruin sin Roatan (Mahogany Bay).

 

Ruins in Cozumel are small. Trip to Tulum, which is very scenic but small late era city and you are restricted to guided pathways, is very long for the amount of time you spend there.

 

In Belize, Altun Ha is closer by, fully excavated easily walked, lower cost to do this via private vendor. Xunantunich as others have mentioned is a good set of ruins to visit, with great views from the top of the temple. Lamanai, is a river/bus trip and long walk through jungle to partially excavated ruins but distance leaves you with very little time to explore.

 

In Costa Maya, if you do a private excursion with Native Choice, you will get a more immersed sense of lower Yucatan Mayan culture and first class guides. Outside of the beach or the boring overpriced cruise port, it's about your only option in Costa Maya. But reconsider doing ruins here if you have an early afternoon departure from CM.

 

Did you have enough time to fully explore the ruins and not feel rushed there?

Thank you

[bUU]

Hi, we are going to be traveling on the Carnival Magic from November 11th to the 18th. We will be visiting Cozumel, Belize City, Mahogany Bay and Costa Maya. My question is which port would it be best to do an excursion to see the Mayan Ruins?

We're on that cruise with you, and will be doing excursions to Mayan Ruins at Cozumel, Belize and Costa Maya. From what I've read, of the ones we're doing, Belize is the one that we should be especially looking forward to: Xunantunich. I'm glad to see that backed up by many of the comments posted above.

 

We chose to do excursions through the cruise line for several reasons: Insurance complexities (which probably won't end up being an issue, but may have), a rather nice three-excursion discount offered, convenience and, with regard to Costa Maya, the early departure time (2pm).