10 Hidden Places to See in Playa del Carmen Away from the Tourist Crowds!
The Real Playa: A Ghost in the Riviera Maya
I’ve been here for seven months now, and I still don’t know the names of half the people I see every morning at the tamale stand on Calle 34. That’s the point. People come to Playa del Carmen to be seen—to pose at Mamitas, to clink glasses on 5th Avenue, to wear linen shirts that haven’t yet been ruined by the 90% humidity. But if you’re like me, you came here to disappear. You came here because the internet is fast enough to run a global empire from a plastic chair, and the tacos are cheap enough that you don’t have to check your bank balance before ordering a third pastor.
Playa is a grid. It’s a predictable, dusty, beautiful grid. Most people never leave the rectangle between the beach and Highway 307. They think the “real Mexico” starts at the airport in Mexico City. They’re wrong. The real Playa is hidden in the cracks of the colonias, in the places where the pavement ends and the smell of roasting chicken takes over. If you want to stop being a tourist and start being a ghost in the machine, follow me.
1. The Northern Wilds of Colosio
Colosio is where the gentrification wave currently crashes and breaks. It’s gritty, it’s colorful, and it’s where you go when you realize that paying $1,500 USD for a studio on 10th Avenue is a sucker’s game. This neighborhood stretches north of Calle 48. The streets aren’t always paved, and the power goes out when the wind blows too hard, but it has a soul that the downtown core lost years ago.
I found a spot here by accident. I was trying to find a shortcut to a beach that didn’t have a beach club, and I ended up at El Pez Guevon. It’s a hole-in-the-wall seafood joint where the floor is basically sand and the beer is always three degrees above freezing. I sat there for four hours once, pretending to work, but mostly just watching a local fisherman argue with his wife about the price of limes. That’s the vibe of Colosio. It’s unpretentious.
