What you can see on the Puerto Cancún cam
The view looks over a hotel beach straight out to the bay, with the marina breakwater and its small light on the left. The water is usually flat and clear here, pale over the sand near the shore and a deeper blue further out. You can watch boats come and go and see how calm the bay is.
The beach at Puerto Cancún, from the SLS
Set low on a hotel beach at Puerto Cancún, this camera looks across the sand to the bay. On the left are a white terrace and a row of beach umbrellas; in the middle stands a large, brightly painted sculpture; on the right a rock groyne runs out into the water, and along the far left of the horizon stretches the marina breakwater with its light.
The water here is usually calm, so the camera is best for watching boats come and go and for the color of the bay through the day. The hotel streams it through Angelcam, with its name and the time on the image.
Where the city meets the hotel zone
The hotel zone was built from 1970 on a long, narrow island of dunes, joined to the mainland by bridges at both ends. Much later, the ground where the island meets the city was developed as Puerto Cancún, a district of about 320 hectares (800 acres) with a marina, private canals, a golf course, a shopping center, homes and hotels, and an ecological reserve. Its beach lies at the start of the short arm of the 7, the arm that looks north across the Bay of Women (Bahía de Mujeres).
Isla Mujeres and Punta Cancún keep most of the Caribbean swell out of the bay, so the sea here is usually gentle. The exception is winter, when cold fronts called nortes blow in from the north and bring waves to the whole bay shore.
When to watch Puerto Cancún
The sun sets to the west, along the coast toward the mainland, so the last hour of daylight brings the warmest light on the bay, and the breakwater light comes on against it. Mornings are often the calmest. The marina is what makes this view different from the other bay beaches: the boats passing the breakwater show at a glance whether the bay is busy or still. Keep an eye on it from June to November, the hurricane season, when the forecast can change the bay in a day.
Nearby
Downtown Cancun is a few minutes inland, and the bay beaches of the hotel zone, among them Playa Langosta, follow one after another to the east. Behind the district lies the Nichupté Lagoon. Ferries to Isla Mujeres leave from Puerto Juárez, just north of downtown.
Getting there
Mexican law makes every beach public, and that includes the sand in front of hotels and private districts like this one. The boulevard and city buses connect Puerto Cancún with downtown and the rest of the hotel zone. Swim only in the marked areas, away from the marina mouth and boat traffic, and check the flags before going in.
