Chac-Chi or Maya Palms? Vote Please!

[JulieandPaul]

We have never been to Costa Maya. All we are looking for is a beautiful, peaceful, uncrowded beach where we can relax under a palm tree, get a lounge chair and food/drink, and where there are nice facilities (bathrooms). After reading all the different posts on CC, we have narrowed it down to Chac-Chi or Maya Palms. Okay, tell us which one we should go to! :confused:

[caribbean dreams]

Excellent question, we will be in Costa Maya in July and are thinking about Chac-Chi unless someone on this board knows of a better relaxing beautiful beach.

[Rasta Pirate]

Have seen the Maya Palms website.

 

Anyone happen to know if Cha-Chi has one, and what the address is?

 

I'd be interested in comparing the two myself.

 

thanx

 

RP

[Eliot Ness]

.......

Anyone happen to know if Cha-Chi has one, and what the address is?.......

Here is the only website I have seen for them:

 

http://www.costamaya-chacchi.com/

 

There are a lot of pictures and reviews in the following thread:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=291724

 

John

[zydecocruiser]

Not sure I've seen a current price (or maybe even a dated one) on how much transportation to/from Maya Palms costs.

[pjinaz]

Don't know about Chac Chi but did spend the day at the Maya Palms in March. It was quite an adventure to get there, bus into town, then taxi to Maya Palms down very sandy road with room for one way traffic, but has two way traffic on road. Jungle on one side of road, ocean views on other. Once at the Maya Palms, great service. The owners came out and greeted us, showed us around their gardens, the beach, pool area, etc. They were the most gracious people. I felt like we were visiting someone's home for the afternoon. Very clean, great food, made us all the drinks and any kind of drinks we wanted. Pool area next to beach with lounge chairs and not busy at all, they only take so many guests. On the beach they have a contest daily to collect certain seeds and plants that come in from Africa and South America, at the end of the day you can enter your finds in their contest and win a t-shirt. They had kayaks they let us use free of charge, they had a guy who worked for them, who cut coconuts out on the beach. Really nice day. The water is a little murky and has some sea grass, due to the barrier reef off shore, it's a world class dive site. They also have a pyramid you can climb and see the cruise ships and the beautiful water. Would highly recommend.

[zydecocruiser]

How much was the taxi ride :confused::confused:

[pjinaz]

If I remember correctly, it was $3 per person to get from the ship into town to where the taxi's were. It is a kind of odd thing, they don't allow taxis to pick people up at the pier, but do allow them to drop off, so you pay at this stand right outside the port for bus tickets and board a bus that drops you in town near the taxis, from there, I think we paid about $40 round trip for 4 people, but I could be way off, it was kind of weird because we took the cab to the Maya Palms and they wanted paid and the Maya Palms people said no, don't pay until they come back and they had a guy there speak to the taxi drivers in Spanish, and then it was a couple extra bucks per person to get dropped off at the pier instead of in town. The people at the Maya Palms probably know the going rate and they were very helpful with taxi drivers.

[Middleager]

Good question. I was looking into this too. My wife and I are going on Miracle this Aug. Have read good reviews for both.

 

You can get to Chac-chi with a little walk and no fee. Sounded good.

 

I had emailed Chac-chi and they responded right away. I want to scuba dive and then enjoy beach, while wife can snorkel or just enjoy. Chac-chi does not have diving, so too bad.

 

It costs to get to Maya Palms and costs to get in. But they have diving and snorkeling, and kayaks, etc. So I am now leaning toward going to Maya Palms.

[pjinaz]

When we went to the Maya Palms the fee to get in covered either food or drink and they actually let us add on I think $10 or $12 when we got there to our entry price and we had both food and drink included. I am sure you would spend that much on food and depending on how much you drink, but the Maya Palms even made frozen drinks without alcohol for our kids and all of their water is purified so totally safe to drink. They are really a small dive resort that gets a little bit of cruise traffic, so when the ships are in port most of the people at the resort are out on a dive. I know this because we talked to the owners a lot the day we were there. I don't know how the beach is at the Chi Chic or whatever it's called, that may be a consideration for you as the beach at Maya Palms was nice, but it did have a lot of debris (not bad debris, natural stuff) from the ocean, seeds, parts of plants, sea grass, etc. also since the reef is right off of their beach the water is kind of weird, so if wife is planning on hanging on the beach and swimming in the ocean all day you may want to find out about water at other beach. However the pool area is lovely, the service is great and the grounds are beautiful, the owners grow orchids.