A-Frame Bamboo Cabin

The adventure pick. This bamboo A-frame sits in a small eco-project deep in the Chiapas jungle, about ninety minutes from Palenque town and its Mayan ruins, near indigenous villages on the Chacamax River. It's genuinely off-grid: solar power, spring-fed showers, no AC, wifi barely there — you come to swim in the river's clear swimming hole, walk the forest with Benjamin the resident guide, do a cacao workshop or a temazcal sweat lodge, and eat Nancy's vegetarian cooking, grown mostly on the property and priced at 120–150 pesos a meal. One bed, one bath, two guests, and at around $47 a night including fees it's the cheapest stay on this list by a wide margin. 57 reviews at 4.91, mostly from people who knew what they signed up for. Pair two nights here with a dawn visit to the ruins and you've done Chiapas properly.