Mazatlan Van Tours

[realnice46]

Has anyone booked with Mazatlan Van Tours ? We were looking at The Mazatlan Highlights, Shopping, Beaches and Lunch Tour. Would like to know your experience.

[fergmom]

We used Mazatlan Van Tours on our private tour on Jan 3, 2023.  The van was nice and stocked with cold beverages and our driver was very nice.  He brought us by most of the places outlined in the tour I pasted below, which were fine. 

HOWEVER, the beach front restaurant he brought us to was WAY out of the way – 30 minutes to and from downtown and no points of interest along the way.  We made it clear to him that we wanted to go to a restaurant that was NOT a tourist trap and served GOOD, AUTHENTIC Mexican food.  The restaurant we were taken to – La Costa Marinera - they obviously get a kick back from because there were masses of tourist vans parked there.  It took FOREVER to be waited on, forever to be served drinks and food.  The food came and it was all COLD.  The bacon wrapped around my shrimp were RAW.  One of my group had a day of vomiting after only tasting the meat on his dish!!!

The vendors on the beach were merciless.  You could not even see the beach because there were so many, and they even came into the restaurant and up to our table and in our faces several times.  

We complained to the waiter and the manager about the cold and undercooked food and told them we no longer had an appetite and how disappointed we were with our experience while waiting forever at our table.  They were not very apologetic and initially wanted us to pay for all the food.  We had to insist that we were not paying because it was not edible.  The bathrooms were DISGUSTING – dirty paper overflowing and no toilet paper.  I asked the hostess for paper twice and she merely said she told someone else to deal with it.  

This is NOT the experience we asked for and expected.  Tourists do NOT want to be continuously barraged with vendors and to eat food that was by far inferior to Taco Bell fast food.  This is what you described online: “After you have enjoyed the best flavors of Mazatlán, you will return you to your cruise ship.”

We voiced our complete dissatisfaction at the tour desk and with our driver that we had wasted our afternoon - almost two hours - with the drive to and from the restaurant as well as all the time sitting in “paradise” at the restaurant.  It really ruined our trip to Mazatlan.  The tour desk did not offer to reduce our tour fee or compensate us in any way.  We told him and ALL the tour drivers that Americans do NOT want to dine at tourist traps where you can’t even see the scenery because you’re being hammered by an army selling what we consider junk! We can’t get back the time wasted and will not be visiting Mazatlan, where we tipped everyone well, any time soon.  Emailed and called US rep upon our US return. Crickets…

[Mike45LC]

Ferg, did you buy this tour through the cruise line?  You refer to it as a private tour, but you say you complained to the tour desk (which suggests a ship's excursion).  If through the ship, I hope you posted your review on the cruise line's excursions page to warn others.

 

I'm sorry you wasted so much time on this excursion to "paradise."

 

[ikirumata]

We booked Mazatlan Van Tours for our cruise last week. Our driver, JeanCarlo was a very good guide! Although it seemed he had a pre set itinerary in his head, he was very accommodating. He was very knowledgeable about Mazatlan and his narration throughout the tour was enlightening. I think you need to be assertive about what you want. We told him that we wanted to skip some parts ( wasn’t interested in cliff divers) and go do other parts (I really wanted to try Pescado Zarendeado). Between everyone in our tour, we hit all the things we wanted to do. 

 

A couple highlights for us were:

 

A local vanilla soda that he bought for us while we were at Mercado Mechado. I asked for a local soda (I don’t drink alcohol) and he picked out a good one. I wish I could remember the name. 

 

Helado de Queso at a small stand behind the big church. Cheese ice cream! Hand churned. It was excellent!

 

Coconut Shrimp (best I have ever had) and Pescado Zarendeado at La Costa Marinera.  HOWEVER…  fergmom is absolutely correct about the beach vendors. Throughout the meal, they just set up right outside our table and consistently asked to buy their goods. The WORST part was the bands. Full on mariachi/marching bands competing for tips. I felt like I was at a college football stadium. It’s really too bad because the dishes we ordered were superb. La Costa Marinera was right in the middle of the Malecon. It wasnt too far from the other places we visited…Church, Mechado Mercado, Shrimp Market.

 

It was neat to see the statues going up in preparation for their Carnival celebration. JeanCarlo made sure to slow down so that we could snap a few shots on the way back to the cruise terminal. 

 

Mazatlan Van Tours is a company front comprised of several independent van operators. JeanCarlo was our operator for the day and he was excellent.