Puerto Morelos Norte
Overview
North of Puerto Morelos town the coast changes character. The village, with its leaning lighthouse and square, gives way within a couple of kilometres to a run of large all-inclusive complexes set back behind their own frontage, and that resort strip is what this page covers.
The beach here is groomed guests' sand rather than a town beach. There is no public promenade and no settlement between the properties, and access from behind is largely through resort grounds, though the sand itself is public as everywhere in Mexico.
The defining physical feature is offshore and shared with the town: the reef of the Puerto Morelos national reef park runs close inshore along this whole stretch, creating a shallow lagoon between reef and beach.
Our current condition score for this beach is .
Photo summary of last month
Each photograph is published unedited and in date order, and is replaced as newer submissions arrive, so what appears here is the most recent view of the beach rather than a promotional photograph.
This stretch is worth reading carefully, because it contradicts the assumption most visitors bring to a reef coast.
Each property clears its own frontage on its own schedule, so two frames from the same morning a kilometre apart can differ substantially. Judge the water rather than the sand.
Position relative to the Atlantic sargassum belt
Sargassum reaching this coast crosses the tropical Atlantic, enters the Caribbean and is carried north-west along Quintana Roo by the Yucatán Current. Puerto Morelos faces east into that flow like the rest of the corridor between Tulum and Cancún.
The reef here is unusually close inshore, and it is easy to assume that means better conditions. Our record does not support that assumption for this stretch, and the reason is worth setting out plainly.
A reef this close creates a shallow, enclosed lagoon. It does break the incoming swell, so rafts arrive with less force. But once material is inside the lagoon there is almost no wave energy to move it back out, and the reef that kept the sea calm also keeps the weed in. Material that would wash off an open beach within a day or two settles here and stays.
The lagoon is also shallow enough that weed grounds well before the beach, so it can sit visibly in the water across the swimming area while the sand itself has been raked clean. That gap between what a photograph of the sand shows and what a swimmer experiences is wider on this coast than on most.
Shelter, in other words, is not the same thing as cleanliness, and this stretch is the clearest example of it we track.
The sargassum season
The regional season runs from roughly May to August, heaviest in June and July, with a quiet period from late autumn into spring. On a reef-lagoon coast the season is felt as slow accumulation rather than as discrete arrivals, so a poor spell here lasts longer than the same weather would produce on an open beach.
The wider picture for this coast, including how the belt has grown over the past decade, is set out in our Riviera Maya sargassum season guide.
Swimming conditions and safety
The lagoon is calm, shallow and almost surf-free, which makes it easy swimming and good for children, and the reef is close enough to snorkel from the beach at some properties. The bottom is sand and seagrass, so footwear helps.
The reef is a protected national park. Touching or standing on coral is prohibited, and snorkelling trips to the reef proper go with authorised operators. Boat traffic runs between the resorts and the reef throughout the day.
Lifeguard cover is provided by individual resorts during their own hours rather than by a public service.
On sargassum: fresh weed in the water is harmless, if unpleasant to swim through. The sulphurous smell some visitors associate with it comes from material that has decomposed on hot sand for a day or more and is releasing hydrogen sulphide, so a strong smell indicates old weed rather than a fresh arrival.
Choosing a hotel on this stretch
This is resort territory and the choice is which property. The advantage over the Riviera Maya further south is the reef immediately offshore and the proximity to both Cancún airport and Playa del Carmen; the disadvantage is the accumulation described above.
The question to put to a property here is specific: not whether it clears its beach, which they all claim, but whether it clears the water inside the lagoon and how often. On this coast that is the difference that matters, and it is rarely mentioned in a listing.
Puerto Morelos town itself, a few kilometres south, is a genuine alternative for visitors who want restaurants and a square within walking distance, and we track it separately.
Access and getting there
The resort strip is reached from Highway 307 between Cancún and Playa del Carmen by individual hotel access roads. Cancún airport is around 25 to 30 minutes by road, Playa del Carmen about 30 minutes.
Colectivos running the highway between Cancún and Playa del Carmen stop at the Puerto Morelos crucero, from where it is a taxi to the resorts; the town itself is a couple of kilometres east of the highway. ADO coaches serve Cancún and Playa del Carmen.
We do not publish a car park for this stretch, because there is no verified public lot. Parking is resort property and is arranged through the hotel, so it should be confirmed with the property rather than taken from any page.
Check live conditions before you go
A close reef shelters this coast and also holds what gets past it, so conditions here clear more slowly than on the open beaches either side. On the live map we track this stretch with dated photographs and a current condition score, so you can compare it against Puerto Morelos town, Punta Brava and Maroma on the same morning.
See live conditions, photos & cams →