You’re not going to find a 5-star luxury resort or a hotel with bikini clad waitresses serving cocktails topped with little umbrellas to guests lounging by a half-acre pool in Xcalak So if that’s what you’re looking for, save yourself the drive and find a place in Cancun or Playa del Carmen.
What you will find are small hotels with a mostly friendly casual style more appropriate to such a remote location.
One of the first resorts in the area was Costa de Cocos. There are now 16 stone and wood cabanas with private baths along with a central dining room/bar at the resort. Additional services including diving and fishing trips can be arranged directly through the hotel.
Tierra Maya has 6 rooms, some with refrigerators and air conditioning. The hotel’s food and bar service enjoys a good reputation and accepts non-guest walk-ins but reservations are suggested.
Playa Sonrisa offers a total of 6 rooms ranging from two air-conditioned suites to two garden cabanas with ceiling fan only. Food and bar service are available. Playa Sonrisa is also Xcalak’s only clothing optional hotel.
Sandwood Villas has three (900 square foot) apartments each with a small kitchen area, 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. Food and bar service is also available.
Sin Duda Villas is a nicely decorated and well-designed mixture of 7 private rooms, suites and apartments–all with kitchen facilities.
Casa de Suenos, formally known as Villa La Guacamaya; offers 2 beachfront bedrooms, each with private bathrooms. The rooms share a kitchen and dining room. There is also a separate 2nd floor apartment with a view of the beach.
Over the years, we’ve stayed at Costa De Cocos and Playa Sonrisa and had meals and/or spent time visiting at Sandwood, Casa de Suenos, Tierra Maya and Sin Duda; which pretty much covers all the above “hotels” available in and near Xcalak. As long as you understand where you are and have a realistic expectation of what to expect, we think any represent a reasonable option.
The only rental property we’ve stayed at in Xcalak is Las Palmas, formerly known as Cielos Azules and that was back before new owners took over. It’s a 3 bedroom/3 bath house located on the beach road bout 10km north of the town. While some might find the drive to town an issue, we always appreciated the isolation and the open vistas of the beach that the location provided. The upstairs of the property have 2 master suites including in suite bathroom and a balcony providing a nice view of the area.
On the low end of the accommodation scale, very basic budget lodging can be found in town at Hotel Coracol. Don’t expect hot water or 24-hour electrical service. A short step up for in town accommodations is the 3-room Hotel Gonzales. Reservations are not available at either of these two hotels.
You won’t find hot water and can only count on 4 hours of electricity each day but you can find very basic economical in-town lodging at the Xcalak Caribe Restaurant and Beach Bar. Reservations are not available.
Another option for the frugal traveler is Maya Village Cabanas. Maya Village is on the beach immediately north of the bridge in Xcalak. At last check the price for camping with bath house use was 30 pesos a day. Screened, lockable palapas with 2 hammocks were 150 pesos and tents could be rented for an extra 60 pesos a day. We haven’t been by since they opened but understand that Maya Village also includes the open air bar Alan’s Folly 2.