Shooting may wound tourism

The murder of one U.S. official and the wounding of another traveling along a highway between Mexico City and Monterrey is expected to have a severely negative effect on vacation travel to Mexico. Details as yet are sketchy, but it is known that the two were driving in an armored SUV when they were stopped about mid-afternoon and shot with assault rifles.

In the past year, 11 Americans have been murdered in Mexico. While none were vacationing tourists, the increasing level of criminal violence is expected to discourage holiday travel in the country.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting from Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Violence scares away spring breakers

Spring breakers, who usually start pouring into Mexican beach resorts about now, are staying away in droves, according to local tourism officials. In some areas, reservations are off by up to 85 percent. Pedro Haces, of the Acapulco Hotel Association, blames the decline on reports of violence in the resort city. Management at the hotel Copacabana says that where in the past it has been booked solid for the final week in February, this year only 15 percent of its rooms have been sold. In Cancun, the Hotel Oasis reports it expects business to be off by as much as 30 percent. Not everyone is unhappy. Rowdy spring breakers are blamed for driving more conservative vacationers to seek sunshine elsewhere. One of Mexico´s big attraction is that 18 year olds can drink legally, and in many places, IDs are not carefully checked.

--Jimm Budd

Reporting from Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Chains Expand

Hilton and InterContinental both expect to grow in Mexico in the months ahead. Hilton is looking at six Hampton Inns including three Doubletrees, two Homewood Suites plus a Garden Inn. Half of these will open this year. InterContinental is talking about half-a-billion dollars going into the opening of 47 hotels during the next three years with a total of 5,000 rooms. City Express, a rapidly expanding Mexican chain of inexpensive inns, has announced that about a dozen franchised properties will be opened within the next two years. All of these are in new structures built to the parent company’s specifications. One reason for all this investment may be that business is good. The Tourism Ministry announced hotel occupancy in 2010 grew by an average of 9.9 percent, led by Puerto Vallarta, which saw a growth of 33 percent, followed by Acapulco, 23 percent, and Guadalajara, 11 percent.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting from Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Royal Tour

President Felipe Calderón has been taking travel star Peter Greenberg on what is being called the Royal Tour, showing the television journalist around the Yucatan Peninsula and, most recently, Jalisco. All this for a program scheduled to be broadcast on the Travel Channel in September. Last month, Calderón declared 2011 to be Mexico Tourism Year and now seems intent on showing this was more than a meaningless decree. While some travelers are concerned about safety as gangs battle for control of drug routes, Calderón is enjoying the same type of security afforded to Obama during his peregrinations.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting from Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Holiday

Today is Constitution Day (Observed), a national holiday marking the anniversary (on 5 February) of the signing of the 1917 Constitution, which, when promulgated, was considered perhaps the most radical such document in the world. It replaced the 1857 Constitution that provided for freedom of religion and replaced the 1824 Constitution, which created the Mexican United States (now officially translated as the United Mexican States). Although the Constitution of the United States of America is regarded as the oldest of the world’s constitutions, it was preceded by several years by the 1776 New Hampshire Constitution when New Hampshire considered itself a sovereign and independent state.

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Jim Budd

Reporting from Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Riviera Maya airport delayed again

Request for bids to construct a Riviera Maya airport has been delayed again. This time, the National Competition Council gets the blame. The Council wants ASUR (Southern Airports) barred from bidding. ASUR operates CUN, second-busiest airport in the country. The Riviera Maya airport, which probably will be located about 100 miles south of Cancun, would attempt to lure traffic away from CUN. The new airport is needed, goes the argument, because it takes some travelers three hours or more to reach resorts located closer to Tulum than to Cancun. On occasion, ASUR executives have argued that serving both airports directly would be too expensive for airlines. Nonetheless, if a Riviera Maya airport is built, ASUR wants a chance to participate in the bidding and plans to take the matter to court.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting from Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Mazatlan gets its cruise ships back

The Tourism Ministry has announced that cruise ships will be returning to Mazatlan. Tourism Minister Gloria Guevara met with an organization representing cruise line operators and pledged efforts will be made to guarantee the safety of all passengers. What apparently were muggings of passengers in three separate incidents led to the cancellation of visits to Mazatlan by three ships. This cost the port an estimated quarter-of-a-million dollars in lost revenue for taxi drivers, sightseeing companies, trinket sellers and others. It was added that the Canadian shot last month in the leg by a stray bullet was not a cruise ship passenger.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting from Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers