Punta Sur Eco Beach Park

The southern tip of Cozumel is kept wild as the Punta Sur reserve - a park of dunes, lagoons and reef beach where the island shows what it looked like before the piers. The Celarain lighthouse anchors the point: a white 1930s tower whose spiral stair earns a full-circle panorama of Caribbean blues on one side and the Colombia lagoon's greens on the other, with a small nautical museum in the keeper's house and the stub of El Caracol - a Maya shrine whose conch-embedded walls are said to have whistled hurricane warnings in high wind - nearby. The lagoon side belongs to the residents: viewing platforms overlook crocodiles idling like driftwood among the mangroves, and the wetlands feed herons, spoonbills and wintering flamingos. The sea side is the reward - a long, uncrowded white beach with palapas, beach bars and roped snorkeling over the reef's inshore gardens, where turtles graze within casual swimming distance. Between them run sandy tracks toured by park shuttles, bicycles and iguanas of unhurried seniority.

The landscape

• The Celarain lighthouse - the spiral climb and two-sea panorama.
• The crocodile lagoon - residents at ease below the platforms.
• The reef beach - snorkel gardens off quiet white sand.
• El Caracol - the small whistling shrine of the Maya.

When to go

Dry-season days; mornings for wildlife and the calmest snorkeling, with north winds occasionally roughening the sea in winter. Cruise-heavy days raise numbers but the park absorbs them.

Things to know

It is a managed park with entry fees and internal distances - transport inside matters in the heat. Crocodiles are viewed from platforms, not paths; obey the barriers. Beach bars operate island prices.

Nearby

The wild east-coast road runs north from the point past surf beaches and beach shacks toward San Gervasio's turnoff.