Merida Mexico on the Yucatan peninsula is a great place to go in winter. The weather is beautiful and the vibe is relaxed, a great alternative to the craziness of Cancun. The city itself has a beautiful main square, where on weekends there is a large outdoor market where you can buy gifts and get street food (try the elotes, it was one of my favorite things).
It is the largest city on the Yucatan peninsula with beautiful colonial buildings and lots of live music at the many restaurants around. There’s lots of things to do within the city and nearby, but these are the best things to check out if it is your first time visiting the city.
Where to Stay
There are quite a few options around Merida, including the well known hotels like the Holiday Inn, as well as boutique hotels like Hotel Boutique Real San Juan (which is the boutique hotel where I stayed). But there are also a lot of great AirB&Bs in the area, some with their own pools.
Best time to visit
A good time visit is through the winter, especially from January to March. Temperatures are typically in the 80s and sunny. In the summers, it gets extremely hot and humid and in the fall is hurricane season, so if you want to escape the winter for a bit, this is the best time to go.
How to get there
Depending on where you are coming from there are a few direct flights into Merida, but most flights will have you fly from Mexico City. That airport is pretty easy to navigate, but you will still need to go through customs, so give yourself some extra time.
How to get around
There’s several ways to get around Merida, especially if you want to explore around outside of the city.
Rental car
It’s really cheap to rent a car in Merida and I would recommend using Discover cars. They work with local car companies and often include insurance. You have to be careful about the insurance, your credit card is not enough, they require a specific Mexican liability insurance and the nice thing about Discover Cars is they include that.
This isn’t the most sustainable way to get around, but it is by far the easiest.
Take the bus
The public transportation in the area is improving year by year with the influx of people and tourists. You can grab a bus from the airport to downtown Merida for just over $2. When you arrive head to the ADO window and ask for a ticket for the bus, which will be waiting outside the terminal.
There are also buses to places like Celestun, but they take around 2 1/2 to 3 hours with many stops in between and often run a bit off schedule.
Call an Uber
You can use your Uber app in Merida and it’s actually very reasonably priced and you don’t have to worry about getting swindled by the taxis. Uber can take you anywhere you want to go, but there are limits. Some of the sites, like Uxmal, are a bit more remote and getting an Uber from there may be a bit more of a challenge.
Take a Taxi
There are plenty of taxi’s around, but I was warned by many people that they will often take advantage of tourists. If you do plan to take a taxi, make sure you go with one who has and uses a meter.
Go on a group or private tour
One of the easiest and the best ways to see the surrounding area is to go with a tour guide on a group or private tour. Taking a private tour is a great option, because it is not that much more than a group tour and you can visit things at your own pace and make changes to the itinerary to visit the places you want to see. One of the first things you should do is book your tours, because they can fill up and you don’t want to miss out on the chance of seeing flamingos or swimming in a cenote.
Best Restaurants
There are lots of great places to eat around Merida from food stalls and street vendors to fancier dining. If you are looking for something local like an elote, your best option are the food stalls on the weekends around the main square.
Some of my top recommendations for places to eat include Gorditos, El trapiche, Picheta, Las chaya maya, and El Nuevo tucho (especially this one, for fresh ceviche and live music).
Best Things to do
Visit Chichen Itza
Chichen Itza is one of the most visited of the archaeological sites in the area. It’s closer to Cancun, so sees many more people every year compared to Uxmal. It is a UNESCO world heritage site and impressive, but the crowds make it much more commercialized. There are several tours that visit this area in a day and no tour company seems to be better than any other.
Visit Uxmal and Kabah
In my opinion these are the best of the archaeological sites and a must do day trip as part of your tour. Kabah is the best place to visit if you want the place to yourself. It’s is an impressive site and so quiet. While we were there we only saw one other couple. You can pay extra for a local guide to explain the mayan ruins to you and is the best way to make the most out of your visit, but not necessary. They have great signage around that explains the different buildings and talks about the people that lived there.
Visiting Kabah is 80 pesos per person, which you pay in addition to your tour (if you are planning to take a tour).
Uxmal, is a larger site and sees around 300,000 visitors a year. It’s significantly less than Chichen Itza, which is in the millions of visitors a year, but you can get closer to the ruins and it is a huge site. I was very impressed by these ruins, which are extremely well preserved and scuttling around the ruins on a hot day are a whole mess of spiny tailed iguanas. It’s like they were the guardians of these ancient ruins.
The entrance fees to Uxmal are around 560 pesos per person on top of your tour fee. You can drive to both of these sites if you have a rental car, there is plenty of parking around.
Visit Celestun and take a boat ride to see the flamingos
Celestun is the perfect place to spend a day if you are looking for a laid back beach vibe, plus an incredible amount of wildlife in the biosphere reserve. It is one of the most popular things to do as a day trip from Merida. I loved it here.
You can take a boat ride, which will take you to see the pink flamingos, if you visit between December and March, when they migrate to the area to breed and have their young. They will also take you into the mangroves and to an area of the waters where you can bath in the mud, which is said to have healing properties.
The other option is to take a kayak. I did not find any options to do this as a tour from Merida and is an option if you plan to spend a night or two in Celestun, as kayak tours often leave early in the morning and spend much more time exploring the mangroves.
You can also get much closer to the flamingos in a kayak and to the other wildlife in the area. If you have the time and flexibility, I would highly recommend this as a boat tour is about 1-2 hours long, whereas a kayak tour can be up to 4 hours of exploring.
Take a swim in a cenote
There are so many different places to see cenotes around. The cenotes were created a long time ago when a crater hit the area. The limestone then formed pockets in the ground that are all connected and pools of water formed. They are incredible. There are three different types of cenote, fully closed, where you walk down into a cave like area and pool is within, partially closed, where there is some ceiling overhead, or fully opened and more lake like.
The biggest concentration of cenotes is in the town of Homun. I recommend visiting Santa Barbara, because there are around 4 different cenotes to visit and is a great way to experience all three types of cenote. You can get to these cenotes in several ways, including a taxi (least recommended), rental car, or with a tour.
Honorable mention
The Chocolate museum is typically a part of the tour to Kabah and Uxmal, as well as a cenote located on an abandoned hacienda. Because we opted for a private tour (cost was 3500 pesos for the two of us to do the private tour), we skipped the chocolate museum and that particular cenote to go to Homun and the Santa Barbara cenotes instead. However, others that were visiting at the same time said the chocolate museum was definitely worth visiting and they highly recommended it, however, that particular cenote was a big disappointment.
Concluding Thoughts
The colonial architecture of this vibrant city, the food and culture and the beauty of the surrounding area is a good reason to visit here. There is so much to see within the city and nearby that you should plan to spend at least a week, if not longer, to really enjoy the area. Relax in Celestun for a couple days, drive the four hours to Tulum and visit some of the other wildlife reserves in the area, you will not be disappointed.
If you are looking for other sustainable destinations, check out my post on the top 5 sustainable destinations to visit in 2025.
