Best beaches in Mexico: readers’ travel tips
Winning tip: beach huts and hammocks at Punta Zicatela Hidden away at the far end of Puerto Escondido’s five-mile beach, Punta Zicatela is a cross between surfer paradise and hippy hideaway. By far the best place to swim in town, La Punta is centred on a street of cafes, surf shops, hostels and restaurants. Cabañas Buena Onda (bed in dorms from about £4) is a simple hostel on the beach offering individual huts, dormitories and tents. The palm trees provide muchneeded shade, a place to sling a hammock, and give the place an authentic, jungle feel. There is a simple kitchen and basic washing facilities – don’t go there if you want the full spa treatment – but there are few better places in Mexico to watch the sunset than from one of their beach chairs with a cold Caguama beer. By night, the Punta is generally quiet – jump in a taxi to Zicatela for bars and nightclubs – but there are also plenty of opportunities for card games, impromptu acoustic concerts and stargazing.
San Agustinillo: pristine beach Between Puerto Escondido and Pochutla on Oaxaca’s Pacific coast sits the tiny town of San Agustinillo and perhaps the finest pristine beach in Mexico. The sand is soft, the palm trees sway, the waves are huge and endless. Sunset sees serious surfers share the evening with traditional dancers and music. Hemmed in by cliffs, it has resisted major development and yet found space for cosmopolitan restaurants and luxury and budget accommodation by the beach and on a hillside - at the budget end Posada Paloma (doubles from £17) and El Recinto del Viento(doubles from £12) are superb. This is Mexico as it should be – catch it while you can.
Tulum: peace, quiet and ruins
Playa Las Gatas: a watery Jesus
Imagine sand as soft as sifted flour, a cyan sky and 13th-century Mayan ruins atop a rocky cliff and you have Tulum, a refreshingly unreconstructed resort on Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula. Compared with Cancún, 80 miles to the north, Tulum will appeal to those who want to let the silence in and experience a sense of timelessness. We stayed at the Secret Garden Tulum Hotel (doubles from £63) which offers a green oasis at reasonable prices. For a dip there are natural limestone pools nearby – and the warm Caribbean sea of course.
Playa Las Gatas, three miles south of the Zihuatanejo on the Pacific coast, is accessible only by boat or a treacherous pathway, so getting there always seems like an adventure. Named for the whiskered nurse sharks (gatas) that once were common in these waters, Playa Las Gatas offers white sand, and spectacular snorkelling. Adventurous souls can discover “the King of Kings” a four-metre submerged statue of Jesus placed on the seabed by locals. There are many excellent restaurants along the beach but the coconut shrimp at Otilia is hard to beat.
Akumal: treehouse cocktails
While on the east coast we stopped at the YucatĂĄn town of Akumal to do some snorkelling alongside turtles. As much as this was a huge highlight, we also found a great bar/restaurant/hotel called La Buena Vida (doubles from ÂŁ90), which has a few treehouses. We climbed up a rickety ladder into a private treehouse and our cocktails were placed in a bucket below: we pulled it up and drank while looking out over the white sand.
Isla Mujeres: swim with whale sharks The four-mile long “Island of the Women” has some of the best beaches in Mexico. This tranquil island, a 20minute ferry ride from Cancún, is fringed with unspoilt white sand beaches and is fabulous for snorkelling and diving. Visit the Musa underwater sculpture, swim alongside whale sharks or dolphins or simply chill on one of the island’s northern or western beaches, such as wonderful Playa Norte.