‘Ghost town’: Rocky Point feeling tourism loss after Lukeville Port of Entry closure

Passage through the Lukeville Port of Entry is the most popular route to Rocky Point.

LUKEVILLE, Ariz. — Puerto Peñasco, or Rocky Point, is feeling a major loss after the most popular route to “Arizona’s Beach” closed with no reopening date in sight.

“Everything was closed. I mean, it was like a little ghost town,” Ruben Cordova, a business owner in Rocky Point, said. “Local business, restaurants, hotels, rentals, everything has declined.”

Since the Lukeville Port of Entry on the Arizona-Mexico border closed on Dec. 4, tourists are faced with taking an alternative route through San Luis or Nogales or cancel their plans.

Many people are choosing the latter option.

“We just have zero to very little business going on right now because people are not choosing to drive the extra two and a half hours,” Scott Poturalski, a real estate broker in Rocky Point, said.

Business in the vacation destination is usually slow in December, but Poturalski said the emptiness on the beaches and in restaurants is reminiscent of the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown.

“I had a Christmas party for our employees Friday night in one of the nicer restaurants in Rocky Point, and on a Friday night, we were the only group in there the entire night,” Poturalski said.

Agents from the Lukeville Port of Entry were… Read full article here