Dolphin Discovery Riviera Maya — Attraction in Quintana Roo

I am writing to share my experience in Riviera Maya. Now I realise how naive I was believing that dolphins in captivity may live in decent conditions and that the statement "Because the only one that loves Dolphins more than you...is Us (Dolphin Discovery)" could be true.

Being fascinated by the wild animals and totally in love with Dolphins and their uniqueness, I have decided to swim with them ...touch and learn more about the "happy" mammals at Dolphins Discovery in Puerto Aventuras.

There were three more people with me that were inside this pool (I would rather call it "cage") with Dolphin called Charlie. There are two more Dolphins in the same "cage" with Charlie, that at the same time as I was there were swimming with two girls that paid for "Royal Swim".

I asked the "Dolphin trainer" if these Dolphins live in this particular pool all the time. She told me that the workers sometimes switch the Dolphins in the "cages". They have 12 Dolphins at the moment and most of them live 3 in one pool, which is definitely too small for such big and fast animals.

The water in the "cage" is not clean enough. I do realise that the water comes from the sea, but the way it makes is through the channel, which is shared with the port they have inside the Puerto Aventuras.There a too many fishing boats, which, I guess, do not prevent pollution by reducing harmful emissions.

The Dolphins are located in the centre of hotels and apartments, next to bars and restaurants, what actually means that the Dolphins live in constant noise.

In the evening, I came back to the Puerto Aventuras and I saw the Dolphins again... They were looking at each other thru the fence. Chasing each other not in the very friendly way (In the morning that day I asked the "Dolphin trainer" why the Dolphins have scratches all over their bodies and the answer was: they play and sometimes they are clumsy). One of the Dolphins was swimming near to the people with open mouth obviously asking for food. People around the fence were trying to reach the Dolphin.

It was so hard to see these precious animals in this condition... I have to underline that other animals: Sea Lions and Manatees, seem to be in the same situation. I saw one Sea Lion that couldn't open his left eye. One of the Dolphins had also one eye closed... Of course I could be mistaken and MAYBE the animals in Puerto Aventuras are kept in good conditions, but, even if it sounds silly, I saw the eyes of these Dolphins that were looking at me with a deep sorrow...

I have promised myself that I will never again participate in any shows with wild animals and will never support such organisations. I would be so happy to have a possibility to just release these animals and give them back their life in the ocean.

Please think twice before paying for the torture of the...

Unfortunately they are smiling face thieves. Bring your bank account And expect to be over charged if you don’t know any better and left over-drafted too! They profile and treat everyone differently. Everyone pays different price, just depends who u are I guess. when u don’t buy the picture package they try to throw money ontop of your taxi fee so they can make something on the side.

I had a much more affordable and enjoyable time doing this at Athonys Key resort in Roatan, Honduras. I could have taken my own picture and still had the option to buy the photographers pictures for way less than half the price these guys tried to hustle me for. Read everyone’s review and see for yourself.

Super expensive, paid for 5 people, husband wife and three kids. One child was too short to do all the activities. However You still have to pay the same price. I was not going to participate but ofcourse I have to accompany my kids. I still paid (same price) to get in so my kids can enjoy the experience. they kicked me out for taking a picture of my child with my own phone. They told me I have to pay $250 US dollars to the photographer if I want to take pictures with my phone or have him take them. I complied and asked if I can have my money back and they told me no. I asked if I can see where I signed saying I can’t take pictures and they began studdering and did not present it. It was so bad as you can see in the video I posted, another person even got upset and started arguing for me as well.

It was so embarrassing and humiliating!

I wish I would of just went with the show instead of paying to swim with the dolphins. Not worth it. They literally hide you on the side of the wall to keep ur family members from taking pictures of you and the dolphins. Forcing you to pay them $250 for photos if you want pictures.

Don’t even bother calling the manager. He had zero interest in working with me. I asked them “why don’t you just take my credit for the activity and use it for the photos since I paid for the activities and can’t do them.” He said no. The only option he said I had was to fill out an incident report lol

The manager finally came back and has confirmed that I did not sign anything saying I can’t take pictures. His excuse was my phone can fall in the water and hurt the animals and they are trying to protect the animals.

Even better, now when I go back and ask for a taxi, the girl smiled called for me on her cell phone and she smiles and tell me 1200. I explained to them I paid 1000 like the board with the prices said, to come she They told me well I can walk down to the taxi pick up down the road where they have that sign.

WE GOT TO THE SIGN! It’s 900 not even 1000!

This place...

I'm honestly really torn on this rating. It's hard to have a bad time getting to swim with dolphins and manatees and get a kiss from a sea lion. With that said, we didn't have a bad time by ANY means.... But there were a few highly disappointing things we did experience. 1) First and foremost, you should know that you are not allowed to bring a camera anywhere near any of the animals. With that said, they are happy to offer you a photo package... For EIGHTY-FIVE Dollars...... PER PERSON! There's apparently a $10 discount for a large group so $75pp (That's still $450). We had six people in our group. We asked for the cost for one group photo. We were told $45.... PER PERSON. That's $270 for one picture. Do we all get a printout, no. We would get ONE printout for our group of SIX people from different households. They didn't get a single good photo of my ride 2) We had one kid with us who decided she was too scared to do the ride. We asked if someone from our group could do her ride instead and were told no. However, they told us she could get more time with the dolphin and do other things..... That never happened. 3) Since we had a kid with us, one of us had to stay back with her during the sea lion part. We were told that after the dad was done, that person could swap and do the experience. What they meant was that he would watch the first part of the experience, then he would miss the second part of it, and the mom could watch the second part. So you only get half the experience of you have to do a kid swap.... Which is REALLY sad because the sea lion part was amazing! 4) The experience ended an hour and 20 minutes before our ride was scheduled. So you eat... Which takes ten to fifteen minutes... And then you just have to sit around for an hour. I'm sure this is intentional so you're in the gift shop, but it's a total waste of the vacation.

With all of that said, the trainers were very nice. The experience itself is wonderful. I'm just not sure I would do it again at THAT place. The last time we did it at a different place and the cost was $45pp for photos. We did it at another place that offered $40pp or $150 for a family of 4 or 5 and then $200 for 6 or more. Three experiences were equivalent so I definitely would not go back to this one. The fact that we were told at our resort that photos would be somewhere from $30-$40pp was a down right lie and not even close to accurate so I'm highly disappointed at the...