Paamul, 87km south of Cancún, is a de facto private beach on a sheltered bay. Like many other spots along the Caribbean coast, it has signs prohibiting entry to nonguests, and parking is limited. The attractions here are great diving and a sandy, palm-fringed beach, which, though lovely, has many small rocks, shells and spiked sea urchins in the shallows offshore; take appropriate measures. An attractive alabaster sand beach lies about 2km north.
Giant sea turtles come ashore here at night in July and August to lay their eggs. If you run across one during an evening stroll along the beach, keep your distance and don’t turn your flashlight on – or take flash photography – or you might scare it away. If you come by bus, it’s a 500m walk from the highway to the hotel, beach and onsite dive shop. A large recreational vehicle (RV) park here is greatly favored by snowbirds; the ‘BC’ license plates you see are from British Columbia, not Baja California.
