Booked via Royal Caribbean, Food and Tequila Walking Tour of Ensenada, duration advertised 2 1/2 hours, but we ran over 3 hours, and had a delayed one hour start pushing our return close to gangway up time. I was resting shortly after getting back on ship in my cabin, and felt the ship move so pay attention to the time. Price was only around $50 as the excursion was discounted via the cruise line. As for the tour it was great, and you will get in some steps. Guide Angel, my group 15 persons which was ideal to interact with each other, and to fit in the vendors comfortably. Group meet at a vendor booth setup opposite the $RCL ship, and walked as a group into town. First Stop, the Fish Market to learn about the freshly caught fish, then a stop where we sat down and were served bottles of beverages, plus had a yummy Shrimp Taco, and explored a wide range of Salsas with in house made chips. Second Stop, a Confection shop with an indulgent number of sample sweets to be tasted and if wanted purchased. Huge platters of Fruit / Nut hand rolled sweets were tasted. Third Stop, Tequila tasting, more than a dozen sips were had across a wide range of tequilas. Tequilas tasted were across a wide range of price points and including flavored variations. Was a fun experience, liquor pours were sips so as to not intoxicate the group. Numerous bottles were purchased by the group. My favorite was the flavored Quita Penas. Fourth Stop, La Michocana for Mexican fruit popsicles, known as paletas, a nice stop to cleanse the palate. Fifth Stop, more Beverages, and a choice of 2 Tacos, that were really good, and at this point the Cruise Ship was again in view, but still a few minutes walk away. Overall a good value / experience, and a comfortable walking tour where our guide Angel watched over us, and smoothed over any language issues. Can happily endorse this excursion that is only available from this vendor via Royal Caribbean. read more

Explora Caribe - More than a dozen Tequila were sipped, my favorite the flavored Quita Penas. I'm a lite drinker. - Tours Near Me - Playa del Carmen, ROO

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This is a review for The Taco Trail in Ensenada. Barbara was our guide and she was excellent. She was extremely knowledgeable about the local culture and had answers for every one of our questions. She was personable and outgoing. We visited four taco shops, including one with a Michelin star. The food was always good, but some were better than good. It took 3 1/2 hours to complete the tour, but there were a couple of stops just to show us sites in the Ensenada area. The biggest issue on our excursion was the van itself. We fit 16 people into the van and it was extremely tight. There was very limited knee room and it made for an uncomfortable trip. read more

Explora Caribe - The best tostada ever - Tours Near Me - Playa del Carmen, ROO

On a western Caribbean cruise, we stopped in Cozumel and did a Jeep excursion with this operator. We went to the south point of Cozumel to a Mayan ruin which was described by our tour guide as a form of notification system for hurricanes. The area was in the middle of mangroves. We saw a crocodile why'd was neat. The beach snorkel area was beautiful. We had lunch whisk was a salad, a fruit plate and either tacos fajitas or quesadilla. It was pretty good. The only downside were the bees. They were everywhere really making lunch not very enjoyable. Once we put the fruit in a separate area. It helped distract them a bit. Our guides Bernardo and Jesus were very professional. They had safety if the guests as top priority. They were funny and gave great history information. read more

(excursion) ... Royal Caribbean's "Save a Sea Turtle Experience" in Cozumel. Sept 12. $96 USD (early discount). ... run by Explora Caribe (tl;dr) ... Nacho was a great guide except for one "miscommunication." At the very end, he apologized. ... we really did save some sea turtles, and it was very educational. Unique. ... the excursion is only 4 hours in the morning, and only 1 hour is actually on the beach with the sea turtles. Another hour is at a touristy beach. (stakeholders) ... Royal Caribbean ... Explora Caribe (organizers, guides, transport, photographers) ... the conservation biologists ... vendors/restaurant at tourist beach (good) ... the bus, which was open-air but with a roof ... the bus drove around all of Cozumel that was accessible, and Nacho gave excellent commentary throughout (funny and educational) ... can haggle down prices at touristy beach (friend got the $40 photo book for $20) ... at touristy beach restaurant, one free margarita ... easy shower to clean off sand ... the memory book looks nice (see pics) ... really nice digital certificate sent after (see pic) (it's like a flipped version of memory book cover) (less good) ... no option to skip tourist beach and help more with the turtles ... half the tour is turtles, but half is touristy beach. But the RC description mentions only turtles (misleading). ... the touristy beach was expensive (haggle or skip) ... they took our photo with the turtles, but didn't say they'd automatically print a glossy version. If you don't buy it, then that photo goes in the trash, which is bad for the environment. ... at touristy restaurant (Restaurante Punta Morena) (https://maps.app.goo.gl/RR4x2an72ddtejVp7) ... ... confusion over "one free drink" ended in upsell (it's only one plain margarita, or perhaps lemonade if you don't drink; anything else you pay for) (see pics for menu) ... ... ditto over any free snacks (there are none) (you pay for all chips/salsa/guac) ... ... ditto over bill (it will already have tax and tip added) (notes) ... turtles would be released to the ocean later (dark) ... turtle hatching and crawling to the sea happens at night (so not an option for cruise ships) ... excursion said 8:30 am. Ticket said meet at 8:15 am. Guide doesn't start walking to the bus until 8:30 am. ... we went first to the turtles, then the touristy beach. I think another ship's excursion did the opposite (so we weren't all digging for turtles at the same time). ... we each got one latex glove for digging ... two biologists helped us at the beach ... our group was divided among 4 nests, with 6-7 ppl per nest. We saved 17 turtles. If you think about it, are we really saving sea turtles? The biologists--or others on the excursion--would do the work regardless. However, the memory book says some proceeds go to the sea turtle conservation. Also, first-hand baby sea turtle experience is priceless. And the stories we tell have real consequences on animal survival and quality of life. (see TED talk about the teddy bear) (https://blog.ted.com/the-strange-story-of-the-teddy-bear-jon-mooallem-at-ted2014/) read more

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3.5 STARS My cousins and I decided to do a snorkel excursion while in Cozumel. We booked the 3 Reef Snorkel by Boat the day before for Friday, December 7th at 8:30am through our cruise ship, Royal Caribbean's Harmony of the Seas. It was priced at $58 each. Getting to the boat was easy enough. We just walked off the ship and headed to the end of the pier. A guide was there to gather us and bring us to the boat. The excursion itself includes all the required equipment: snorkel, mask, fins, and life vest. They even give you a bottle of water. The life vest is mandatory, but you don't have to blow it up, so if you wanna dive down, you still can. The stops themselves were fine, but super crowded. Like get kicked in your face crowded. I found myself swimming away from the group as I wanted to just enjoy the water and look at the sea life. I still stayed more or less on the perimeter of the crowd as I didn't want to miss the boat when it left. Fish were plentiful. But I'm pretty sure someone had food on them as they always swarmed our guide. One thing I didn't really care for was the person going around taking pictures. Probably for their ads and website? He came up to me and tried to tell me to dive down for a pic. It just interrupted my serene experience and also caught me off guard. I ended up choking on a bunch of water. I just declined and kept snorkeling. I love water, so a fun experience. Especially since I did it with my cousins. Overall, not a bad snorkel excursion. Note: I think they have a partnership with Margaritaville as the sticker you get at the beginning of the excursion can be redeemed for a margarita afterwards. Bumped them up in rating just for that. read more

Explora Caribe - 3 Reef Snorkel by Boat - Tours Near Me - Playa del Carmen, ROO

We booked the Calafia Valley Wine Country Tour on our Royal Caribbean cruise vacation through Explora Caribe. The tour advertised "tales of the area's history, people, and culture while traveling alongside an informative guide." Additionally, "visit two renowned wineries and tour the expansive vineyards, roam the cellars." In researching this tour, I expected to visit La Casa De Doña Lupe and L.A. Cetto, which are minutes away from each other. We did not visit L.A. Cetto. They took us to a second winery (25 minutes away and a rough bus ride on a dirt road) called Matilde. Matilde is a new winery that is still under construction. The winery will be beautiful when it complete, but for now it is partially completed. They serve 3 wines - one rosé, one red blend, and one red. Unfortunately, it seems as if this company cannot handle the growing cruise demand coming out of California. Our guide (Samantha) was very young and incredibly uniformed. She admittedly didn't speak much English, didn't read script she was given, and we had a silent bus ride ride...outside of her singing 3 songs...karaoke style. I didn't learn about Ensenada, Calafia wine country, the wineries we visited, the wine we drank, or any part of this area's people/culture. One of my favorite parts about a tour bus excursion is hearing the guide's stories and pride in their city/country. When we arrived at the first winery, she dropped us off and we were not given any information, including how to navigate the winery. No one told us about the wines, the winery, the history of the winery. Highly disappointing. We found the tasting area and tried 4 wines each. The man pouring has great customer service and poured wines that we preferred - white and red. There was a large selection of wine. Our guide was serving bread and cheese in the corner of the market room. Unfortunately, she didn't know what kind of cheese she was giving us. The second winery was beautiful and the gentleman that greeted us gave us a quick tour of the vines. The 3 wines they have were excellent. Unfortunately, the winery isn't finished and it was under construction. We would have appreciated our guide letting us know that there was no food at the second winery. It ended up being an almost five hour tour and we ate one piece of bread and 4 cubes of cheese. Overall, there's nothing I would recommend about this tour and I'm disappointed that this company would hire a guide of this poor quality. Your guide can make or break a tour. She broke ours. read more

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Boat = Island Reef Staff = Cpt. Abraham, Guide Extrodinair Gill, Chef/Bartender Jorge, and crew Jesus, Mike & Luis. Awesome attentive Staff, great munchies, with more alcohol than you should be drinking. Highly recommended by our group of 60 for a day of snorkeling and fun! read more

This tour is amazing! We had Fernando & Julio as guides and they kept us laughing the entire time. We did it all in a day... crocodile sight seeing, the light house, Mayan ruins, snorkeling and a delicious buffet lunch at the most beautiful beach & then finished the tour off with tequila tasting. A lot of fun! Highly recommended. read more

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Our tour was amazing. We did the Monster Jeep to Hidden Mayan Ruin and Virgin Beach - Exclusive. During the tour, we only saw a small ruin (one little structure near the beach that was used for signaling). Which were told upfront from our guide that this is exactly what we were seeing and it was still very interesting. Our guide was Oscar with help from Miguel. They made the experience so enjoyable. You literally hop in a Jeep and drive through town and down the highway to arrive at the entrance to the tour. The views are absolutely beautiful. The private beach was very nice. It's sad to see the pollution on the beach. It's uninhabited so the trash of plastic is washed up on the beach. That didn't ruin anything by amy means, just a sad reminder of where pollution lands. The private beach time included a Mexican lunch that was delicious - soft tacos beef and chicken, guacamole, salsa and chips, refreshments. The Jeep tour was quite a ride - when they ask if you have back issues, they mean it! It's totally manageable and and a fun experience. We were advised to take bug spray but we didn't end up needing it but that could depend on the timing of your excursion. I would highly recommend this excursion and I hope if you do you have Oscar as your guide. He was so informative, fun, and kind. When the tour is done you stop by a shop for a tequila tasting for about 30 minutes. This part was just okay. I would recommend booking this excursion with a group of 4 people you know. If not, you may end up in a Jeep with people you don't know and your riding through a city with unknown streets and signals, and taking an off road ride. If you're comfortable with not knowing who your riding along with then don't worry! read more

Explora Caribe - Tequila tour stop. - Tours Near Me - Playa del Carmen, ROO

3 Reef Snorkel by Boat - Cozumel May 16, from Grandeur of the Sea, Royal Caribbean wonderful experience, great snorkeling, really expert guides. however: I paid for some underwater photos during the trip but never received them. Every attempt to contact Explora Caribe failed. Email, text, nothing works. Hella Hennessee read more

We did the 3 Reefs snorkeling tour. Boat picked everyone up at docks at their hotel and took all the Covid safety precautions. We had Captain Elias, first mate Leo and our snorkel guide Chavito. Saw Baracuda, Sea Turtle, Rays and huge starfish. Finished the tour with fresh fruit and homemade ceviche for all 11 of us! Highly recommend this tour! read more