Leading us farther into the site, down another jungle path with no signs of other humans, she pointed out large, tree-covered mounds that we learned were additional temples yet to be excavated. Stopping for a moment to let us soak in the magnificent structure, Alonzo talked about the complex culture of the Mayans who lived here more than 1,000 years ago, and the ritual practices of sacrifice that took place here. There was only a single small tour group at the Mayan ruins of Chacchoben on Tuesday. Again, the area was completely devoid of tourists. Our guide, Leticia Alonzo, led us down an empty path through stands of sculpture-like strangler fig trees to a clearing in front of a soaring, pyramid-like temple. But there were no other tourists in sight. There was a small, open-air souvenir shop that had opened just for us, with only a few sales people, and a bathroom with an attendant. The tour bus that had taken me and 25 of my fellow Celebrity Edge cruisers from the port of Costa Maya pulled up to a mostly deserted entrance area carved out of a jungle. It wasn’t until we arrived at Chacchoben that I realized we would be the only people there. In pre-coronavirus days, it often would get three cruise ship visits in a single day. It’s now just starting to ramp back up in a very modest way.įor all of July, the port only is expecting only three cruise ship visits - two from Celebrity Edge and one from a Carnival Cruise Line vessel, Carnival Breeze. When cruise ships stopped arriving last year, the area’s entire economy essentially shut down.

More than almost any other tourist area in the Caribbean, Costa Maya and its environs rely almost entirely on cruise ships to deliver visitors. A small tour group from Celebrity Edge had the Mayan ruins of Chacchoben entirely to themselves on Tuesday. But right now, it’s essentially a ghost town. In a normal year, Costa Maya is the second-busiest cruise port on the Caribbean side of Mexico, drawing more than 1 million cruise visitors a year. I arrived at Costa Maya on Tuesday morning aboard Celebrity Cruises’ Celebrity Edge - the very first cruise vessel to stop at the port since the COVID-19 pandemic began in March 2020. Related: 13 of the most beautiful villages and small towns in Mexico The return of cruise ships There have been so few tourists to this part of the Yucatan since cruise ships shut down operations in early 2020 that they didn’t even bother to reopen Chacchoben to visitors until Tuesday. In fact, I was also one of just 26 people to have visited the site all year. I was one of only 26 people to visit the site all day. But when I visited it on Tuesday, it was almost empty.

Open to visitors since 2002, it’s normally jammed with cruise tourists on half-day tours from cruise ships visiting Costa Maya. I’m talking about Chacchoben, the still-being-excavated complex of large Mayan temples and massive platform groups about 43 miles inland from Costa Maya.įor more travel news, reviews and tips, sign up for TPG’s newsletter. But, for the next few weeks at least, and maybe months, there’s an unusual experience to be had along the southern coast of the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico.Īs I saw firsthand on Tuesday during a visit to Costa Maya, Mexico - the normally bustling cruise port near Mexico’s border with Belize - you can have an entire Mayan ruin site almost to yourself.

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