Customer Reviews

Moon Yucatan Peninsula: Including Chiapas (Moon Handbooks)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In preparation for a week-long trip to the Yucatan, I looked through several guidebooks: Frommers fell short, Lonely Planet failed to impress, the Rough Guide was quite good, but Moon was consistently the best. First, it is a very good value: Moon has about 100 pages more than the Rough Guide, and almost 200 more than Lonely Planet and Frommers, all for about the same price. Yet, the book feels no bulkier than its competitors.

Moon takes advantage of this extra space and fills it with good descriptions of the various locations, good maps, and good recommendations of places to eat and sleep. I appreciated the fact that Moon gave recommendations for a wide range of budgets, as many other guides tend to be overly skewed toward one category of traveler to the neglect of others. Partially by design and partially by coincidence, we ended up eating at many of Moon's recommended restaurants and staying at many of the recommended hotels, and had very good experiences at all of them. My only minor complaint is that I wished they'd marked the direction of one-way streets for cities like Merida like the Rough Guide did.

For anyone planning a trip to the Yucatan, the Moon guide is an indispensable traveling companion. Definitely the best of the guides I used for planning before hand and referencing once in the Yucatan.

I found this book much more accessible, helpful, and accurate than the rough guides version. A great balance of historical info, recommendations for sites, hotels, and restaurants, and commentary. I've always been an avid Let's Go fan, but sometimes they get too cheap and hostel-oriented for me. Moon's books (I bought several after this one) seem to represent the cheap/free and off-the-beaten-path attractions equally with choices that are a little more mainstream and comfortable. My only complaint is one that I always seem to have: I would have liked more maps.

I really depended on this book to familiarize myself and get me around Chiapas, and it did a great job. Some reviews of restaurants and hotels were a bit out of date, but, of course, that is normal with a guide book. I found the layout easier to use than Lonely Planet, but they were both good and complimented each other.
My only complaint was the scale of the maps was inaccurate for walking in San Cristobal and distances were a lot farther than I thought when starting out.

First off, I'd like to say that I live in Merida, Mexico. This guidebook might be good for someone visiting the Yucatan for a few weeks, but I would not recommended it for someone who wants to explore everything. I cannot attest to the hotel accommodations as I've never used them. But I find the attraction reviews not on par with my own opinions. He poo-poo's EVERYTHING that isn't as grandiose as Chichen Itza or Uxmal.

I chose this book because it had much better reviews than Lonely Planet or the other guides. That being said.....I've put up with a lot from this book and I am finally retiring it, it discourages going to smaller Mayan sites, which I understand for someone who has a limited amount of time. But my husband and I really enjoy the small sights. I'm glad we go to them despite what the author says. For example, we went to Xcambo last weekend and I found it to be lovely. It was free, interesting and you can see the coast from the highest pyramid. Oh yeah, we were also the only people there which made me feel like a female Indiana Jones. Anyway, we also decided to explore some of the beach towns so I brought my trusty moon guide. This is where they REALLY lost me. We went to Telchac Puerto where the guide book says: "the hotel also has an extensive (yes, they used extensive) English Language bookstore...." Since my husband and I drool at the sight of books in English, we stopped in. Well this "bookstore" consisted of 20 old dusty paperbacks and a dozen crappy VHS movies. It was hilarious, but alas, this is the end for me and this book. I'm buying the lonely planet guide.

We found this book to be better put together and a better compendium of knowledge. Of course, even with the most recent edition, prices were off a bit (even in a recession), but it is hard to get all of it right. We also used the Lonely Planet Guide and Frommer's, but found the index in this book to be the best as well. There can always be more info, but there is so much in the area, it is hard to get it all.

I greatly enjoyed reading information about the Yucatan Peninsula from someone who had lived there rather than just visited. It brings a broader perspective. Also, the author writes objectively, focusing on the information to be shared without asserting her own personality. I highly recommend it.

Recommended by the Smithsonian tour groups, I found this a very helpful "tour guide" for visiting a new part of Mexico.