Is Cozumel good for solo travelers?

Base yourself in San Miguel, the island's only town, rather than in the all-inclusive strip south of the cruise piers. Within six blocks of Parque Benito Juárez you can walk to the ferry pier, the Mercado Municipal, and most dive shops, so you rarely need a taxi after dinner. On Sunday evenings the plaza fills with local families and a live band, you can smell marquesitas crisping on hot irons, and it is the easiest place on Cozumel to sit on a bench and fall into conversation. Eating alone is no problem in San Miguel: most restaurants along Avenida 5 and Calle 3 Sur will seat one person at the bar, and nobody asks for a party of two. That said, San Miguel changes by the hour. When five or six cruise ships dock, the Avenida Rafael Melgar waterfront fills with day-trippers and jewellery-shop touts between roughly 9am and 5pm; by 7pm the passengers are back aboard and the malecon belongs to joggers and fishermen again.

Diving is how solo visitors meet people on Cozumel, and we think it is the single best reason to come alone. Boats leave San Miguel for two-tank morning trips into Arrecifes de Cozumel National Park, to Palancar, Colombia and Santa Rosa Wall, usually with six to twelve divers aboard, and shops routinely pair single divers with a buddy. Dinner plans tend to get made during the surface interval, over cold watermelon slices with salt drying in your hair. Non-divers get the same effect from small-group snorkel boats booked through Viator; our advice is to choose one capped at 10 or 12 people and pass on the 40-seat catamarans sold at the cruise pier. Watch the pricing. Dive-and-stay packages on Cozumel are often quoted per person on double occupancy, so ask for the room-only rate and book the diving separately. A US$20 bill currently buys about MX$370, and paying in pesos beats the rounded-up dollar prices on menus near the piers.

Most solo travellers' real mistakes on Cozumel happen on the road. Uber does not currently operate on the island, so you're working with the taxi union's zone-based fares from the start, and drivers who quote in dollars tend to round up, so ask the price before you get in and carry small peso notes. The scooter rentals along the waterfront look cheap, but gravel on the bends of the coastal road catches riders new to two wheels. For the east coast, where the wind blasts in and the Caribbean thumps against limestone, rent a small car for a day instead. That coast has stretches with no phone signal and no streetlights, and the rip currents run strong enough that locals swim only in sheltered coves such as Chen Rio. Go in daylight, tell your hotel your route, and be back over the cross-island road before dark. Punta Sur, at the southern tip, has the Caracol Maya structure and a lighthouse you can climb. San Gervasio sits inland, and both are easy to visit alone before the 10am tour buses arrive.

Where you sleep comes down to budget and how much company you want. Hostelito, a few blocks inland from the main plaza, has dorms, private rooms, and a rooftop where guests trade dive-shop tips over morning coffee. Small family-run hotels on Calle 6 Norte, such as Hotel Flamingo, tend to charge a single traveller close to the double rate, a reflection of a small island with few single rooms. Before booking, run a single-occupancy search on Trip.com, because prices can differ widely between listings. Stays beyond a week on Cozumel get quiet: the expat scene is small and organised nightlife is thin, so many solo visitors take the Ultramar or Winjet ferry, about 45 minutes, to Playa del Carmen for a livelier night. Check that day's last return sailing before you cross, because missing it means paying for a room on the mainland.