Playa Norte Celestún — Attraction in Yucatán

This review is for the motorboat tour from the beach only. On the same day we tried 3 different tours as we wanted to see more and more of flamingos. This, the official motorboat by the river one and kayak tour. Although it’s the cheapest one (400 pesos), it’s the worst and not worth the money. Out of 1,5 hour tour you spend 1 hour riding a boat from the beach to the river and back. So only 30 minutes to see flamingoes and mangroves. And the ride is horrible, I was afraid to injure my spine (and I’m young and fit), but the boat went so fast and so bumpy, that I kept jumping on the very stiff bench, I felt my spine compressing. We saw 1 flock of flamingoes and turned around straight after. While it was a mixed group, a guide didn’t speak much and haven’t made an effort to tell anything on English. I’m not a big fan of the river motorboat tour either (the official one under the bridge), but at least they spend whole 1,5 hours on the river, not driving there. P.S. My favourite tour was the kayak one - it was very individual, lasted 2 hours, we saw 10 species of birds and even 3 crocodiles. It was almost the same price, but 2 guides worked for us individually and spoke...

The beach is quiet, no vendors, excellent sunsets and if you want to see flamingos it is ok. I love exploring new places in Mexico. I have been to lots of off the the beaten path towns and rarely been disappointed. Unfortunately Celestun is a huge dissapointment. Pot holed roads, broken sidewalks, garbage, packs of street dogs, piles of dog poop every 10 metres and crumbling and abandoned houses. Celestun is a broken 3rd world town. It is the most neglected town I have visited in the Yucatan and the people dont appear to care. It is in desperate need of infastructure and a tourisim board. I dont know the socio-ecomic circumstances of Celestun, but untill they change my best advice is...Go to Progresso or Rio Lagartos. ...

Unfortunately it's obvious this town has no pride in it's village... streets covered in garbage and pot holes everywhere...restaurants in this town serve terrible food at inflated prices...plus 12th street everywhere we went they harassed us saying we couldn't park just wanted to have a beer and enjoy the beach but no were told all the parking is reserved...the town was dead I guess they don't want to sell you anything unless you pay to park...tours are another rip off won't take you for less than 3500 pesos or wait till they fill the boat with passengers...much better...