I arrived at Hotel San Carlos with my 9 years old son as arranged. The place was down an unmade side street and really dirty and run down. I handed a copy of our booking form (booked on the internet) to the two girls at reception and handed over 100 dollars. The booking form stated that the room, with ensuite facilities, was $27.50 a night and described as having air conditioning. After taking account of our deposit, it stated that the balance to pay on arrival was US $98.98. for 4 nights.

After counting the $100, one of them showed me a calculator with an amount of 160 and said, “Pay dollars”. I pointed to the amount of $98.98 and said I had paid a deposit. They looked at me, laughed, shook their heads and pointed to the 160 on the calculator. After 20 frustrating minutes of trying to get them to see sense (they didn’t speak English), a Mexican guy came along who spoke a small amount of English. He said we hadn’t left a deposit and the $11 was “internet money”. He said we should pay $160 or 1760 pesos, which one of the girls wrote on my booking form after deleting the original amounts. I was furious but, as we were hot and tired (after our 10 hour flight from England) and had nowhere else to stay, I asked the price for one night. The price was $40. I asked to see the room. We were given a key for room 13 and walked up the stairs to look. It was an empty room, apart from two beds. It was dirty, hot and with no air conditioning, no toilet, shower or washbasin- in fact, nothing like as described when booking. We went back to the reception and when I mentioned air conditioning and shower, the interpreter told them and they howled with laughter. The interpreter said, “Air con more money”. This was the last straw and we walked out with our backpacks, concerned that we had to find a place to stay. We came across a decent hotel just a few blocks away for $30 a night with air conditioning and ensuite facilities.

Booking at San Carlos just caused a whole lot of hassle, which we did not need. The idea of booking a hotel was, obviously, to make our first few days hassle free. I have spent years backpacking around the world and stayed at many types of hostels and hotels, but the experience at San Carlos was the worst ever. Had we not paid a deposit and booked a room, we would have taken one look at this run down hotel and just walked right by. It is described as follows:

“Besides excellent facilities we offer you comfortable rooms in an agreeable environment with the best service. Visit us and verify that the services which we provide are excellent, leaving you happy and smiling! Our hostel has been recently remodelled and we offer the best rates in downtown Cancun. Our rooms have air conditioning and fans."

The only part of this description, which is correct, is that there was a fan in the room. The above description is so far away from the truth and should not be allowed.

The rest of our 3 weeks in Cancun was great. A girl from Texas showed us where she was staying- a fantastic, clean and great value for money hotel, where the staff are really lovely people who are friendly and helpful.


Please note- The company that booked the accommodation did so in goodwill. They are very shocked and appalled at what happened and have requested an explanation from the hotel owner. They are refunding our deposit.

Cancun is a great place. Have a great time, but just be careful!!

Best Wishes and Enjoy the World! - Female World Traveller.