Loud and Slow Check-Ins

The owner Ricardo is very knowledgeable, super friendly and has fair prices.

His shop has a height limit of about 2.5m or so so might not be able to accommodate big rigs

We stored out landcruiser here for 3 years during the pandemic. They do not have under cover storage, only outdoors (not sure about less tall vehicles).
After 3 years everything was as we left it, they even tried to start her occasionally until the battery died. Oswaldo speaks English and was super friendly and helpful - we checked in on WhatsApp occasionally to check on her.

+52 664 689 3763
minibodegastijuana.com

Great spot for us as we travelled up Baja in a hurry. Close to the road, but tucked out of view and fairly quiet. Quite clean, but beware of all the sticky and spiky cactus bits on the ground - especially if you have pets.

We saw a fat tailed gecko, a hare, a hummingbird and bats.

Small Carpark on the side of the hill with good hot showers, level places to park, a nice view and good walking access to town. Downsides are not much space or shade, and dogs and roosters are quite loud.

We didn’t have issues with the noise inside our vehicle which blocks a lot of sound, but our friend in a tent was kept up.

We didn’t have any trouble finding it coming via gps route with our small rig. Collectivo mini busses come up the same way.

Owner is friendly and accomodating.

We paid $250/night for 3 people (vehicle plus tent)

Pretty spot for a stopover. $100pp. Pools are actually hot, and moderately clean. They also sell firewood and mud.

Hard to find a level spot, but they exist. The noise from the factory next door was ok during the day but became quite loud overnight, suggest sleeping down the bottom if your setup doesn’t block sound.

They have signs saying no dogs, but allowed ours in when we asked. They did ask if they were big dogs first which probably wouldn’t be allowed in.

A little further on from the coordinates marked. We ended up here after another plan fell through and came in with low expectations. This isn’t a bad spot to spend the night, there is a river and grassy areas, baño with seats, a swarm of swallows around sunset and the caves. We were charged $50pp.

Be aware though, this is a moderately busy thoroughfare for reaching the next town. We weren’t bothered by the noise sleeping inside our vehicle, but had someone with us in a tent who was kept up by passing traffic.

Long RVs wouldn’t fit well here, but other more compact big rigs could probably make it work ok.

Really, really great donuts. Hotdog and fries are not good.

We came here for a full fluid change / service. They went above and beyond to look after us and search for parts that we needed. Good price, one of the guys speaks fluent English. Can’t recommend enough.
They will let you stay overnight if you are unable to drive while they work.
They’re got a big space, big rigs will fit here.

Wonderful spot! It’s quite hot here, but on the hill we had a palapa for shade and a cooling breeze most of the time.
The beach is perfect for beginner surfers and had barely any trash, but up the hill there was some (we took away the more obvious bits).
We saw dolphins and the timid dog others have mentioned. She is sweet and doesn’t seem too skinny, she turns up at dinner time and in the morning and sits a metre away just in case you feel like sharing your meal. She didn’t care about our dogs wandering around but ours didn’t pay any attention to her.
The road out isn’t especially rough but takes about 15 minutes to travel

We have used this place 3 times and are happy with each experience. Each time we were asked to return at 8pm and received our dried and folded clothes. They do not use a drier as another reviewer mentioned, however slight wrinkling on some clothes does not matter to us and is better environmentally!

Really cool ruins set on a steep hill, and extra nice because they are so quiet. Only 5 other people here today which is apparently a public holiday. We got in for free, not sure why.

Beautiful falls, but very busy and many tourist stalls next to them and a couple of tour busses worth of people so not a tranquil spot. We visited on a public holiday so they may be much nicer mid week.
We were a bit disappointed for the price (50pp) because we didn’t feel like spending long here.

$12 for 20 litres or $7 for 10 (I think actually about 9). Next to the Pemex

Cute and yummy Japanese restaurant in an alley. We had garlic ramen (ok; $95 medium), tonkotsu ramen (great, large $155), pork belly bao (great, $45), and teba karaage (great, $75 for 5 small drumettes).

A nice Indian restaurant! The buffet is 240pp and had a decent range of curries and includes excellent naan. Otherwise curries looked like they ranged from $160-90 and naans $30-$40.
Definitely worth the trip if you are missing Indian food as much as we were!

Permanently closed according to google maps

No dogs allowed, didn’t stay here
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opens at 6:30pm
Decent pastor dishes and decent prices (eg 15/ flour taco, 12/corn). Also have vegetarian burritos, mushroom quesadillas, etc.
Kiwi margaritas very salty

Beautiful property, lovely owners, yummy breakfast can be arranged in advance. They don’t have a liquor licence this year, but said we could store beers in their fridge if we bought some in town. Wifi is now working and quite good. $20BZ / night for 3 people.

Pretty good pizza and super lovely owner

A very nice Guatemalan trained doctor. Speaks Spanish and English. Reasonably priced private doctor (40 BZ for consultation). Good diagnostician. Can refer out for blood tests, etc.
See photo for business card

Not the nicest room, but one of the few options that allows dogs (at least right now, Island is pretty close to capacity). Has aircon and fan, but no towels. Our booking.com booking didn’t reach the hotel, best to book directly.

As previously said. Email ahead to organise a tour. They don’t currently have any baby manatees (great for the manatees, a shame for us as selfish tourists) but they had a few older ones closer to release which we watched bottle feed. They also had monkeys which you cannot get too close to, but they were showing off their acrobatics for us!
Definitely worth a trip if you are in the area, or even if your aren’t in the area if you are into manatees or interested in the work they are doing.

The road to Sarteneja is very potholed though so beware! From Sarteneja it’s maybe 15 mins, but google won’t route it because there is a small gap in the roads.

No English speakers, but we showed the certificates we had and didn’t have any problems. It was 1000 pesos total for both dogs to get health certificate to enter Belize and rabies booster. They said Belize wouldn’t accept the 3 year booster that was still current. They also did a brief checkover of the dogs (took temperature, looked in ears, etc).
They also stock royal canin food but said Belize might not let a new bag in.

We were not allowed to get to the ruins with our dogs, the guards at the second entrance were strong on this point, even when we said they would stay in the car.
They said something about leaving them at the restaurant next to the campground up the road, but we didn’t check this option out.

We were not allowed to get to the ruins with our dogs, the guards at the second entrance were strong on this point, even when we said they would stay in the car.
They said something about leaving them at the restaurant next to the campground up the road, but we didn’t check this option out.

Tried to charge us 320 pp, we didn’t stay
Howler monkeys very loudly howling while we were there. Very rough road to get there, not big rig friendly

Busy, small, and you can’t walk around in he ruins, just on paths.
We came here Christmas eve with visiting family and only managed to arrive around 11am so the crowds weren’t really a surprise. If you had the place to yourself it would probably be lovely as the setting is really nice looking over the water, although the ruins aren’t the most interesting.
Lots of tourist shops, Starbucks, etc out front and the most aggressive tour guides we’ve seen (lying about line length to buy a ticket; and how long it was to walk to the site trying to convince us to go with them).

Really yummy burritos and sauces on the side for reasonably prices (75 pesos each). We had a vegetarian and a El pastor burrito, both were delicious. They are on the smaller size, but enough for a lunch. Consider getting some chips and guac if you are a big eater.

I wouldn’t camp here as someone mentioned (it’s just a patch of dirt on the side of the main road, and the supermarket up the road is a decent spot)

We aren’t German, but us Aussies appreciate great baked goods too. The bread is amazing and the pastries are flakey and delicious. Best we’ve had in a long while touring North America.