We went to Playa del Carmen last August and stayed at the Royal. It was a block from 5th which is the market, so we were right at all the shopping, bars, and restaurants in town. We had never really left Texas, so we went through a travel agent. It was around $4000 for flights, taxis, gratuities, and resort. Ours was adults only and next door to their kids allowed resort. That allowed us 7 restaurants at ours, and another 4 at theirs. We were so excited and couldn't wait, but now I honestly don't think we'd even consider it again.
Our airport pick up that was booked didn't look for us, we had to find them which took almost an hour. The poolside service closed at 6, and all outside bars/pool closed at 8. 4 of the restaurants were a buffet, and the other 3 only served a couple items. They were all French or Italian infused, not regular local Mexican food. After a day or two we ended up going into town to eat, and we aren't drinkers either. So the all inclusive part was wasted money we could have spent elsewhere.
We had never been, so we thought we were special when they told us we were platinum members. They insisted on taking us to dinner and explaining it's benefits. They ended up trying to sell us a time share, and just kept sending someone else to speak with us or trash talking us when we weren't interested. The manager literally said "what kind of parent doesn't want to take their kids on a vacation?" We complained to the travel agent when we got back, and she acted like it was normal and we should've known better.
We booked our excursions through the resort which was bleh. They sold us a 12 person English speaking tour to Chichen Itza, with all included food and drinks. Ended up on a loaded down bus with a stale bologna sandwich and room temperature orange juice. The tour guide barely spoke English and if you got more than 30' from him your headset didn't work. We should have just grabbed a taxi and went by ourselves, as we ended up walking around without him after a while.
We went up and down the beach as far as we could walk in both Playa del Carmen and Cozumel. Both beaches couldn't have sucked worse. There was a 2' tall 4' wide mound of seaweed as far as you could see on every beach we found. All of them were full of sharp rocks, so they were unusable. We quickly figured out why everyone just stayed in the pool.
The cenotes were pretty neat, as well as snorkeling the reefs. We enjoyed riding the catamaran and swimming with dolphins. My wife is messcan, and even she refuses to ever go back to Mexico. We did hear Isle de Mujures is gorgeous, we just ran out of time trying to get there.
We went on a 7 day cruise from New Orleans in Jan to Cozumel, Roatan, Belize, and Costa Maya. The beaches in Cozumel were the same as in August and so were the ones in Costa Maya. Roatan and Belize was exactly as pictured. Beautiful beaches and breathtaking views everywhere. The cruise was $429 a person for an interior room. The only downfall was waking up not knowing if it was daylight or dark without looking for a clock. If you get a window room check the floor, as the ones on the 8th floor got a beautiful view of a lifeboat for 7 days. They charged 18% gratuity for everything, and $13-15 per day per person as a tip for housecleaning. We had maybe 6 drinks a piece the entire 7 days so a drink package wasn't worth it for us. We went to the store in Cozumel and picked up snacks and drinks for our room after we found out we could bring on anything but alcohol.
I can't say we liked one better than the other after doing both. We were worried about only having 8 hours in port on the ship. But we had to wake up by 530-6 every morning at the hotel to ear breakfast and be ready for the 7am excursion pickup, so it really wasn't much difference there. The only land based benefit was being able to walk around town when we got back. We met a couple that stayed in a regular hotel for 2 weeks, and booked their own flights and excursions for $2000. For someone who doesn't drink much, and wants to enjoy local cuisine that's probably a better route.
Cozumel
Roatan, Honduras
