The Lodge at Chaa Creek

We just came back from a wonderful 3 day stay at Chaa Creek. We very much enjoyed our time at the resort, waking up each morning with singing birds, spotting howler monkey families on our morning walk, visiting the butterfly farm and the nature center, exploring various trails on the property and tasting some fresh and delicious food at the resort's resturant. All staff are super friendly and helpful. Our side trip to visit the Maya ruin "Xunantunich" with Kevlin, a very knowledgeable and friendly guide provided by the resort was memorable and fun.

Amazing Staff Made Trip of Lifetime -
We were part of an adult family of 6, with Ryan as our butler. He made sure that everything went to plan and organized the most spectacular dinners for us. We went to Tikal with Yumi who is one of the best tour guides I’ve ever had - so knowledgeable and the best attitude! ATM with Emil who fearlessly led us through the caves and the decapitation chamber (a real highlight). Walter for his tour of the butterfly garden and museum! Romeo and Lion Heart during the horseback riding made the ride so memorable. Ryan, again, for being so amazing!!
We also asked the bar on our last night to create a flight of all the house made alcohol - a real highlight and should be added to the bar menu!!

We stayed at the Chel Villa, incredible experience for our family. We saw so much wildlife, howler monkeys, iguanas, toucans from our patio with private pool. Large spaces, stunning views. Our personal butler Nelson made the stay one we will remember for our life. This experience is Four Seasons level luxury in the middle of the jungle. We did activities through the resort and those were amazing as well. Mayan pyramid, open hearth cooking, butterfly farm. An amazing place for family or for a relaxing getaway. The food was incredible including a private meal under the stars. Best luxury experience we have stayed at in the world.

Rooms were nice, staff was extremely helpful and the best place was at the bar!

Has an amazing pool and the grounds an environment are on another level of peacefulness!

Stay was great, highly recommend it!

We stayed for three nights in a deluxe cottage and couldn’t have been happier. What we didn’t realise before we arrived was that this place has such an amazing backstory of the Flemings who bought a farm in 1977 and have been developing it ever since - we thought it was lovely this isn’t some big hotel chain and genuine heart and soul has gone into everything here. They give you a magazine telling you the whole story which is fascinating.

The grounds are beautiful, as is the pool and little bar area. We loved the breakfast - especially the new menu launched on our last day and the dinner menu changes every day. We did the chargeable night tour and saw tarantulas, a scorpion, frogs but missed the ant eaters and armadillos and other night crawlers. We saw toucans and hummingbirds and howler monkeys from the grounds, took a canoe ride up the on site river, my wife did the complementary bird watching tour and also did the horse riding with the most beautifully looked after horses.

I think the only slight catch is that it’s a 15-20 min drive into San Ignacio but then again there’s not much there. They have a restaurant in town called the Guava Limb Cafe which serves broadly the same menu as the hotel lunch menu.

We also thought that the cocktails were the best we can ever remember (and this is from a couple who have drunk a LOT of cocktails all over the world) - fresh juices and house infused rum and vodka.

We used this as a base to go to the Xunantunich and Cahal Pech Mayan sites and also went to Caves Branch for the amazing cave tubing.

Having spent a week in San Pedro, it was bliss being surrounded by lush gardens and just the sounds of the jungle.

I’m in awe of what the Flemings have created here, and am really grateful privately owned hotels like this still exist in the world.

We had the best time at Chaa Creek. From the time that we were picked up at the airport, the warmth, the attention to detail, and the overall quality of service was amazing. We used their taxi service to take us to various places and the drivers were like tour guides and super helpful. The food at the restaurant was great and the staff were friendly. They even made sure berries were made available for me during breakfast. The grounds were clean and beautiful with tons of hiking options. Our culinary class was the highlight of our stay though…we made a delicious Garifuna meal with a great host/instructor. We can’t wait to return to the Lodge in the future!!

Initially our impression of this hotel was poor. We were given a cabin without AC in temperatures about 38 degrees centigrade [100 degrees fahrenheit] which we could not handle. There were already 3-4 fans in the room which made no impression and the manager offered us an extra fan. We enquired about an upgrade to a room with AC and the immediate reply was it would be US$275 extra per night . This lead to some interesting discussions and eventually we were offered a free upgrade. After this everything went extremely well.

The replacement room was very adequate and well appointed,

The breakfast and dinner was very good and they had a varied menu. The bar area serviced fairly priced drinks. The pool area was very nice and it served drinks. The complex also had a small boutique shop.

Excursions are only within the grounds of the complex which were interesting but limited. We would have preferred to see Mayan sites.

We visited the local town and its market which being a Saturday made it more interesting.

Everyone was very friendly particularly the restaurant staff.

Amazing

Amazing stay, friendliest staff, great food and drinks, highly recommend!

It was a beautiful place to stay, with excellent staff and so many activities on the property. We would return and stay here again.

From the time you arrive you discover the unique nature of this property. The grounds are beautiful, the accommodations are top notch, the food and wine list exquisite, and the staff extremely kind and helpful. We chose not to partake in may of the available offerings, choosing to simply enjoy the pool and walking throughout the grounds. We did have a guide drive us around the outer property, Our guide Louis was exceedingly knowledgeable, pointing out various birds, monkeys, medicinal herbs, and the like. His knowledge of Mayan history offered a fascinating morning as we drove areas I would never think of driving myself. If you do visit the Lodge ask for Louis as a gude, for any of the trips.

Great aesthetic and perfect location. Rooms/beds are very comfortable.

I have travelled all over the world and stayed in many hotels. The hospitality and kindness shone through. Of course the lodge is beautiful and the rooms have all you need but the staff and owners make this place special.
The food is delicious. Being vegetarian, dinners were made especially for us. The lunch/pool menus have plenty of choice and there wasn't a meal I didn't enjoy.
Complimentary activities on site including upstream canoeing along the river, the butterfly sanctuary and early morning bird watching was easily accessible and very enjoyable.
The lodge is set in beautifully maintained gardens emersed in nature.

My wife and I stayed four nights at Chaa Creek and had a fantastic time. We booked a treetop villa. The villa is enormous - a large living room, bedroom area, bathroom, and shower room. There is a deck that wraps around the villa with several seating areas and a private splash pool. The villa is not a "treehouse" per se. It is at ground level at the entrance but is set on a hill - behind the villa, we were perhaps 50-70 feet above ground with a beautiful view of the river below. We were visited once by a family of howler monkeys, and saw several colorful birds and iguanas in the trees outside of our deck.

The grounds are very large and beautifully landscaped. There are many hiking trails, a gorgeous pool, and a pretty common area with the restaurant and bar. The resort offers many activities at no extra charge. We did the morning birdwatching twice and the night tour once. We would have liked to canoe on the river, but it had rained a lot recently and the current was quite strong, so we passed.

We booked an all-inclusive package that included all meals, a full-day tour and two half-day tours. The food was fine, although not exceptional. The tours were outstanding - we visited two of the Mayan ruin sites, and canoeing in Barton Creek Cave. We loved all three tours, and canoeing in the cave was especially interesting. The package also included transportation from Belize City and a stop at the Belize Zoo, and we arranged for a Chaa Creek guide to take us to our next destination (Placencia, via the Hummingbird Highway). Both road trips were very nice and the zoo was surprisingly fun.

All of the staff were wonderful. Everyone (desk, dining, concierge) was very friendly and very helpful. In particular - the guides are amazing. All of our guided tours, onsite and offsite, were led by very knowledgeable and experienced guides.

We stayed for 4 nights 3 full days at chaa creek before moving onto the cayes. Grounds were truly beautiful as was our room. Food was fantastic and everyone there were so lovely and nice w amazing smiles :-). Our room had only screens so every morning we woke up to the birds. There are quite a few activities which I wish we had taken better advantage of. We did do the early morning bird watch and the night creature walk both of which were super fun.

I didn’t feel this lodging was super convenient to local restaurants in town which we were fine with. We busied ourselves all 3 days w a couple tours and going into San Ignacio but found ourselves tired/ lacking motivation to go back into town to dine though I had heard of some good restaurants there. It is about 10 miles from town and a $30 ride using their transportation, $15 using a street taxi from San Ignacio. Renting a car would have made it all easier but we didn’t go that route. We did most of our eating at the lodge which was very good. The dining menu changed every night and the breakfasts were delicious as well. Really an enjoyable experience.!

This review is for the Macal River Camp. Great experience! The camp hosts are amazing, the food is local and delicious, you have full access to the resort (pool, museum, hikes, bird watching, canoeing), and you are right in the jungle with the wildlife. Howler monkeys make their presence known, toucans are nesting in a tree in camp, and you will hear and see so much more. We went on several excursions to a Mayan site and cave tubing. The guides here are fabulous. Every single person I spoke with on staff had been there for years or decades. Some even had their adult children now working there. Chaa Creek really supports their staff and offers ways for them to expand their knowledge.

The camp tents are basic, but the beds and linens are fine. The bedside rechargeable lamps work really well. They provide towels and bathroom amenities. Showers are nice and hot and the camp bath house is very clean. Laundry facilities are available, but we did not use them. We met some wonderful guests in camp.

I believe any negative reviews regarding the camp were made by people who did not research what they were booking. The camp is a fantastic value, but it is a camp where you will be staying in a cabin with no electricity. The Lodge is a 10 to 15 minute hike on a well maintained trail, but notice I used the word hike and not “walk”.

One suggestion to enhance the camp experience; some sort of fans. The lights are rechargeable, are there similarly chargeable fans available? While we were there it was unseasonably hot, so sleeping was sometimes a bit uncomfortable.

I didn’t love the butterfly farm. It was ver informative, but there are A LOT of butterflies in a very small space. I met someone in camp who had worked with butterflies, and they confirmed this was a very stressful environment for the butterflies and that crowding numerous butterfly species in the same space made it even more stressful. I was also confused about why they aren’t releasing any of the butterflies. It seems that butterflies are crammed into a small space for the enjoyment of the guests, not the sustainability of the butterfly population.

I loved being in the rainforest and waking up to the sounds of birds. The staff is lovely and helpful. the rooms have no keys which takes some getting used to but also makes you feel that stealing isnt a problem. You can lock up your valuables. The excursions are fun and interesting and the massages are great. They really make sure that you have a wonderful experience there.

Very bad WiFI connection otherwise very good

In many categories of our 18 trips to different warm weather vacations they were near the top. Food, service, facilities were great. Our first night there instead of a chocolate left on our pillow there was a pupae in a box. The next morning we a had a butterfly that we released into the wild.

This spring break trip was more than we could hope for. The accomodations qere fantastic. Even without air conditioning, the fans in