La Isla Mérida — Attraction in Yucatán

The most diverse of all the malls in Mérida Yucatán. Its not a basic mall either, it has all American top brands and awesome look, with racially divers staff. Now my problems with this place: horrible WiFi connection, horrible food court with bad seating and 3 of 4 places to eat. The food was meaningless with overly exaggerated pictures and tons of bread. The most recent touch on the food court was the Vegan food and they put her way at the end of the food court next to the bathrooms in the dark. Center area was closed and spooky the outside deck was a waste land of a few sticky tables and the trash can was overflowing. We arrived at about 7:30 pm and the place was packed full of people with little staff. Too Fast of food gone wrong! Long lines in every corner department store. From Starbucks to Zara and all the half store brands in between the place is just not built proper for the people who want to shop. You typically stand in line longer than you shop witch is crazy. Short staffed larger stores and small departments stores in between. I see why there are nothing but big brands in the mall because the square footage price would be insane. Not enough space for more staff but each store is packed. Minimum 45 min wait time. We ordered online and paid online and the 3 lines were still 45 min. Sushi to go 45 min Starbucks line and wait for your name 45 min, food court waiting in line to receiving my food 45 min and still...

Too far outside the city, in the middle of nowhere. Not worth a trip there because there’s really nothing special about it. There is no point going there while the harbor mall or the galerías just within a closer distance to everywhere.

The buildings around the mall also would be a terrible choice to buy or stay as airbnb or as long term rental. Again too far with just bare ground and lots of construction still going on. If you have an emergency it would take hours to get to a facility in traffic, which by the way is terrible. The worse part is people are very rude in traffic, they never show you kindness and takes them a split second to honk if you are late to move or let another car or people go.

In a few weeks I learned my lesson. You must be as aggressive as others in the traffic. Forget about the lanes, just drive as if you’re the owner of the roads. Most of the time there are no lanes anyway.

In short avoid this mall and the buildings in that area. There are much better places, much closer to everything inside the road that looks like a beltway, of course if you love heat as hell and decide to live in Merida.

My opinion about living here: when the Merida...

A nice mall, but surreal experience with mall security guards/wannabe tough cops. Upon leaving the mall I followed a family pushing a stroller out into the underground parking garage and walking to my vehicle when two private guards started yelling at me saying ‘esta es la entrada!!!’ , they then wanted me to reenter the mall and exit the other side - never mind others did the exact same thing. Today is February 26, 2022 and this policy is to prevent the transmission of COVID. Insane after just spending significant money on a rare trip...