No better way to experience the whale sharks! The best captain and tour guide team in the business!!!! - I booked this opportunity at the last minute and went solo because none of my friends were brave enough to join with me. Upon arrival we received a delicious continental breakfast which was clearly made fresh. There was an absolutely amazing poundcake that I could eat every day! When it was time to leave for our excursion, I was lucky enough to be paired with Sergio and Javier, the best tour guide and captain I could have hoped for. Sergio made sure I felt comfortable in the water and got the most amazing video of me swimming with the whale sharks! I took in a bit of saltwater with my first jump and Sergio helped me recover and get ready for a second jump so that I didn’t miss this once in a lifetime opportunity! He stayed by my side the entire time to be sure I was safe and comfortable. Making my safety a number one priority but also getting such an amazing video was above and beyond what I could ever ask for! Our captain Javier really took his job seriously. The almost 1 hour ride out to the whale sharks was quite choppy that day and he made sure we were positioned on the boat for optimum comfort. Once we got to the Whale Shark area Captain Javier was quite focused on the safety of both us as passengers as well as the whale sharks. On the way back to shore we could see him relax a little bit and his personality really shined through! I appreciated that proper balance of focus when needed and fun when the time called for it. Sergio made the most amazing ceviche I’ve ever had and we stopped at Isla Mujeres for about 30 minutes to enjoy the view and an amazing light lunch. I highly recommend this tour company and strongly encourage you to pay for their pictures and video and focus on the moment! Sure you can bring your own GoPro but you want to enjoy this experience with your own eyes and not looking through a tiny lens. I am really glad I spent the extra money on the pictures they provided they were fantastic and worth every penny!

Amazing! Must do - Amazing experience with very helpful guides. We actually had the opportunity to swim twice! With the whaeshark. Luis was such a great guide jumping in the water and guiding you to have the best experience with the whaleshark.

The best for respectful eco-tourism, and most experienced! Book with people from Isla Mujeres, not the mainland! - If you’re looking for an ecologically minded and respectful way to engage in this type of tourism, this is your company. It’s hard to gauge which company is best from reviews and no personal experience, but I’m here to tell you that I went to Isla Mujeres solely to see the whale sharks and I took two different companies. This is the one you want if you want to feel good about swimming with these amazing animals. I’m finding every platform to review them because they were the highlight of my trip to the island. I went with Luis, Marco, and Captain ‘Willy’. Very professional people. I appreciated the care they took to talk about the sharks and how they explained how the use of sunscreen is harmful to the sharks and the reef and the ocean as a whole. It was easy to see that they love these animals and they love their home. While chatting with them at playa Norte, I learned the captain and the company has been doing this for decades with permits that used to only be available to people who lived on Isla Mujeres. The permits have since been given to many others on the mainland over the last few years, which is why there are so many boats at the feeding grounds. True to what they advertise on the website, we were one of the first boats to the sharks and they stayed away from congestion to find sharks. They do this because it is better for the sharks. The first tour I took with a different company a few days earlier, we saw more sharks and I was in the water with multiple sharks at a time, but it was because all the boats and people were basically corralling them together as they tried to feed. It was hectic. Several times I thought I would collide with a shark because their movement was unpredictable due to so many people and boats. This congestion and flurry of activity ended up causing sharks to come too close to boats and ultimately ended with a large shark colliding with the back end of the boat on my first trip with a different company. However, when I was with Marco, Luis, and Captain- they would regularly alert other boats that a shark had submerged and was near them so they would slow down and stop their propellers. Vessel strikes are one of the biggest threats for our friendly giants. I am so glad I decided to book another excursion with DC explorers. They gave me hope that this kind of tourism can be responsible, respectful, educational, and exciting for both the tourists and, most importantly, the endangered animals we are trying to witness. I hope that more people use this company, and I wish that more tour companies would follow their practices. They are very respectful of the animals, and respect and explain the regulations to their passengers. When I go back to Isla Mujeres, I will only want to see the sharks with Luis, Marco, and Captain. Also, I had my own GoPro, but my video was not very professional looking because I was focusing on the sharks and nerding out hard! If you want beautiful pictures and videos, go for their package. I wish I had. And don’t let the enjoyment of your excursion cause you to forget to tip! I had to run to the end of the dock and yell for them to come back after they just dropped me off to give them their tips! Not an ideal situation lol, but they were still appreciative and very kind about it.

Snorkeling with whale sharks - We booked through Dan Palka (VIP Riviera Maya) and were taken out by DC Explorers. We chose Mexico because we wanted to take our boys on this tour. IT DID NOT DISAPPOINT! I can’t describe how amazing it was to be swimming beside then quickly behind these beautiful animals. We all loved it and are already talking about how we can do it again. Our guides were Luis and Captain Willy. They were fantastic!! It is about 1 hour boat ride from marinara to whale shark feeding grounds. The tour is a max of 10 people and you go into the water in pairs with your guide. We got one full round in before the area got crowded. Captain Willy then moved us to another area where we saw so many more whale sharks. After the whale shark swim we anchored off Isla Mujeres and Captain Willy made us ceviche. It was so delicious! Warning if you are prone to sea sickness, this is not the trip for you. Our family isn't but some on our boat did. It allowed us to get more trips in with the sharks but those guys were feeling really bad.

Seeing whale sharks awesome. - The actual experience of swimming with the whale sharks is great. The 2-2 1/2 hour boat ride in a small boat without a v bathroom , pounding up and down going full speed over 3-4 ft swells is not fun. Also at the end..when you are only 10 minutes from returning to dock they spend 45 minutes docked at a popular beach area . I just wanted to see the whale sharks . I wanted to spend the 45 minutes at my hotel beach instead. They could serve the lunch AFTER they dock the boat at the end.

Rushed - It took 2 hours to find one whale shark. When we finally did find one, there were 21 boats circling it and they rushed us into the water to swim with it for just a minute or 2. We skipped the snorkeling on the island, and when we got back to the dock we had to wait almost 2 hours for our ride back to the hotel. Our guide was great and helpful and the captain was nice with the exception of rushing us into the water.

Poor experience - August 25 2021 I've just arrived at the hotel. We did the tour but unfortunately we were not completely satisfied. When buying the excursions, The web said that for each group it includes 2-3 runs each. In our case, 2 occurred. However, in the first run we could not find the shark. The captain gave the order to shoot us when he saw a shark in the distance. Naturally, within the time that we took with the guide to reach the distance where the animal was found, it had already left. When the guide realized it, he mentioned that he would talk to the captain to authorize a third shot since there was no success. This request was denied. On our second attempt we did get to see him briefly. We are aware that the Shark will not be still waiting for us, but we find it unfair that if it could not be observed in one of the runs, the most correct has been to authorize a third, as recommended by the guide. We understand that for workers it is one more day of work, but for us tourists it’s a unique and one-time experience. In our case, not even the guide was able to get us a photo, we never had the moment. The runs according to the videos I recorded when entering the water do not last more than 3min 30 seconds and the web said is 5 min per group. I urge you to communicate with your staff, these situations must be not happen. The captain at all times had a hostile behavior even with his guide. In this work field, there must be a little sympathy and empathy. I hope that this constructive criticism can add up and prevent other tourists from having the same results as me.

Disappointing experience - Let me start with we did a whale shark tour about 6 years ago and it truly was an experience of a life time. Which is why we wanted to do it again. Swimming with these gentle giants was nothing short of a magical experience. Unfortunately, our experience with DC tours was exactly opposite. I’ll start with the good stuff first. DC tours were very responsive with their communication, they were on time and the facilities where we met were very nice. clean bathrooms and a little store where we were able to buy reef safe sunscreen and dramamine there was more at this store too. they served us coffee and banana bread before boarding the boat which was also nice. However, the captain and crew were not very informative or friendly. They didn’t even introduce themselves to us. after about 1.5 hours of a rough ride on the sea (several passenger vomiting over board) and nonstop and unnecessary chatter over the CB radio which included singing in Spanish and strange but loud animal sounds we were at the spot for swimming, along with 30 other boats, each packed with 8 to 10 people. The boat that got there first launched their people two at a time into the water and after a few minutes, there were more than 20 people swimming around, looking for whale sharks, around two minutes, another boat, arriving with more people to launch into the water. They were only a certain amount of people allowed in the water at once so we waited our turn. By the time it was our turn the whales had gone deep into the sea, and were no longer visible. So our captain along with the 30 other boats rushed to the next site where the same thing happened again. By the time we got there, the whales were no longer visible so no one was able to get into the water. This happened four more times over the period of 2 hours. it seemed that, instead of finding whales, the captain was looking for boats with people, jumping off. This seemed to be the indicator of the location of the whales. It felt like the captain was trained to hunt for people, jumping off boats more than he was experienced at finding the location of whale sharks, it was clearly a tourist operation with no effort to actually get us into the water. After about seven hours on the boat, no one had seen or swam with a whale shark. At this point the captain decided to take us to Isle de Mujeres for a swim, which was equally as disappointing and at this point into the excursion a waste of time. The bottom line make sure your tour operator is a marine biologist or has experience with finding real sharks. This tour operation was clearly more about finding other tourist, jumping on boats, and it was about whale sharks and keeping experience more natural. We never swam with a whale shark and the captain and crew did not explain anything to us, or even talk to us the entire seven hours on the boat. All in all, it was a very disappointing and expensive experience. Save your money and do something else.

Not fair! - Don’t pay 80$ for your photo’s.. they never sent us the pictures we paid for!!!! We bought the pictures but never received the link leading to the files, numerous contacts with the company but unanswered. SCAM

Do not recommend - I do not recommend this company. They sell you a start time of the activity which is a lie. You arrive at the place of the whale shark when it is already collapsed with boats. When you arrive at the sighting place it is practically a war to be able to jump and see it even for 1 second among thousands of boats, it is quite dangerous since they can go over your head since the guide is worried about taking photos. For which they will charge you 80 dollars for the photos at the end if you are lucky to appear. A fraud