Go Natural Explorers

4 Stan B - 2 years ago

I did two tours with them - would rate separately.

Tour #1: Tulum and Coba Essentials (solid 3)
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Tulum was fine where the complex is more of a picture-tour and there's very little to see. My guide was Rhett and he was good at highlighting key points. Apart from the nice view, this site seems culturally non-significant

Coba site is much more interesting with Oscar as guide. We all were able to climb up the Coba pyramid - it was impressive to be able to pop up above the jungle and enjoy the surroundings. Coba pyramid is a diamond in the rough as 3 sides are still overgrown with vegetation.

Finally, the Cenote swimming with the underground cave with Oscar made all the difference here. The underground cave was really impressive and I think GNEX should emphasize how exciting this is.
Solid 5 for this part for sure

Tour #2: Chichen-Itza (Solid 4 only because of Gabriel as guide)
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Started horrible with late pick-up and transfer to a bigger bus being driven 1hr in the opposite direction. Transfer driver was extremely rude and vehicle was non AC-ed. Then the bus is full and essentially being marshaled where to sit and what to do.

Overall impression: most of the company and the guides do *not* understand that tourists appreciate their time - most on the bus have sacrificed days from an all-inclusive resort at an additional cost.

Then starts a long journey of sales-pitches - Mayan calendar zodiacs, stop-overs at a souvenir shops, and finally a young Mayan dude trying to sell bottles with your pictures. In any case, did not see anything different than sold on the open-markets. Well - I did just bite my tongue and carried on.

Positives came in Chichen-Itza itself: we had probably the most experienced guide Gabriel walking over details of the history, bringing additional materials and visuals to help us understand how Mayan thought and build this place. Gabriel has innate ability to switch between English and Spanish in very creative ways - so very much liked the jokes and humor coming through!

VERY IMPRESSIVE GABRIEL AND KEEP THE EXCELLENT WORK!

After Chichen-Itza and the late lunch with some sales pitches, went to a Cenote for a swim which was different that my 1st tour and this was fun if anything else.

Finally a short visit to Valladolid - which I think should be totally dropped from the list as this just eats out time.

So GN-EX drop your sales pitches! Keep your experienced guides happy, and find a way to differentiate yourself - there you will get the additional revenue from tourists.

1 ΘΕΟΦΑΝΗΣ ΜΠΟΖΑΡΛΗΣ - a year ago

My wife and I traveled to Mexico and decided to take a trip to Chichen Itza. We asked at the hotel for an excursion and they sent us to “gonatural”. The excursion was about a visit to Chichen Itza, food there, a visit to a private Cenote and a walk in the colonial city of Valladolid.

On the day of the excursion we made an appointment at our hotel at 7 in the morning and in 3 hours to be at Chichen Itza. However, they did not inform us we would stop at Tulum to get more visitors from there! Consequently, after 5 hours, we arrived at a place for food where they introduced us to a man like a magician of Maya and gave us some statues as a gift! I consider this a completely business/money making situation.

A young man took a photo of us as soon as we got out of the van and our guide introduced him as a paparazzi where he wanted to sell us a "maya drink" with our photo from outside!l. At 2 in the noon they took us to Chichen Itza and we got in at 2:30 while in the hotel where we booked the excursion they told us that we will have 3 free hours, we were only left 2! Then they took us to Cenote where there was a big bus with guests enjoying their bath in our "private" Cenote! This was really tragic! At last we returned to our hotel room exhausted and disappointed.

The guide, named Jorge was only speaking in Spanish-not in English without us obviously speaking the language! This was UNACCEPTABLE. If I went again, I would NOT go with the “gonatural” as they told us different stuff at the beginning but we were treated differently. We have been deceived!

5 Heather Driver - 9 months ago

My husband and I enjoyed a fabulous tour in December 2021 of the Tulum ruins with Victor A from Go Natural tours. Victor was an extremely knowledgable, charismatic, charming and thoughtful guide who tailored his attentions to the interests, age and mobility of his clients. His guiding made the mayan ruins of Tulum come alive for us. We highly recommend this tour and guide as the preservation and dissemination of historical knowledge is so important. Thank you Victor!

4 Quinn A. Frazier - a year ago

We had a really fun time on the Mayan Underground Cenote tour. The rappeling and cenote exploring was really fun and informative. Not a lot of opportunity to snorkel but the other things we did - swimming, jumping from platforms and ledges, zip lining, and learning about the Mayan culture was great. Our tour guide, Luis, was animated, attentive, and really did a nice job.

The entire tour took place at the same "property" which was nice, no driving from one cenote to the next - getting in and out of a van. We were the only non-Spanish speakers on the tour but that was never an issue nor did we ever feel like we didn't know what was going on. Luis did a great job with that!

I would recommend this tour but depending on what you think you are purchasing your experience could be different - we were told this was a Centoe snorkeling tour. In my opinion the 4 cenotes we explored and swam in weren't really good for that but offered so much more of a different experience that snorkeling which turned out to be a good experience.

5 greg hough - 2 years ago

Best experience ever! Lalo is an awesome tour guide!

5 Jo Saunders - 2 years ago

I went on the Tulum Hidden Snorkeling adventure and highly recommend it to anyone looking to get the most natural experience of the region. There was a few bus issues to begin the morning with, but they sorted it all out quickly. I was paired with guide Uri for our trip including a tour of the ruins, snorkeling and swimming in the cenotes. Uri has a lovely warm personality that made everyone feel very comfortable and included, as we had a mix of people on the tour and he easily translated between English, Spanish and French. Uri was also very informative, and you could tell his passion to keep everyone safe and happy. Alberto our driver also did a very good job, and was quick in helping us with our equipment and navigating the roads. This was the best day of my trip with many great memories, thank you both!!!

5 Yuna Bloom - 3 years ago

Go natural explorers provided a fantastic tour! The guides were knowledgable, nice and funny. Ulises (our group's guide) really took it to the next level with the information he provided on the Mayan culture. It was evident that this topic is important to him and he takes pride in being a guide for this remarkable place. We learned a lot of new information, we were taken care of in the best way possible. We were late on the way back to the bus at one stop and Ulises had waited for us with a car and took us to the rest of the group within 10 minutes. He certainly made it less embarassing for us :))
We were fed in a buffet which was delicious and had performers give us a show! We went to a cave-type water well and swam there for a while, it was just beautiful. The water clear and fresh, a rope cord to jump off, again great comfort for every step. On the way back we also stopped in a town for 20 minutes and walked around real Mexico for this time, tried some local snacks and tequila. Overall this trip was excellent, and it wouldn't have been like that for the wonderful guides, drivers and others involved in go natural explorers. Thank you again guys, I hope a lot more people take your tours and learn all about these aspects of Mexican and Mayan cultures. God bless