Riviera Maya

The Riviera Maya is the strip of Caribbean coast running south from Cancún airport through Playa del Carmen, Puerto Aventuras and Tulum. Playa del Carmen is about fifty minutes from the airport by road; the resorts further south add half an hour or more.

It is a different holiday from the Cancún hotel zone: the beaches are broader, the resorts sit in jungle rather than on a sandbar, and the cenotes and the ruins are the reason most people come.

We have slept in one resort here so far — Ocean Riviera Paradise, at Playa del Carmen — and its review is below. Nothing on this page carries a score unless we spent the night.