Some hoteliers in Tulum have pointed out that there was no Easter or summer break, due to the difficult situation the tourist destination is going through, as they believe the phrase “Tulum sells itself” no longer applies.
Antonio Requena Bacab, manager of the Chilam Balam hotel, stated that the drop in tourist arrivals has directly affected the local economy. “Hotel occupancy is declining day by day; it’s plummeted. It hasn’t picked up since January. There was no Easter or summer vacation like before; people are no longer coming,” he stated.
Requena Bacab indicated that the crisis is attributed to several factors, one being the restrictions tourists have experienced at the entrance to the Jaguar National Park, which limited visitors’ options.
“We only had Punta Piedra left, and that place isn’t in good condition. Who would want to go there?” he said, adding that there have been cases of police extortion of tourists, “which has generated discontent and mistrust.”
He also mentioned other factors, such as if tourists park badly, “their cars are taken to the impound lot and it costs them up to 10,000 pesos to get it out. It’s an expense they didn’t expect and it keeps them from returning.”
He also noted that recent violent events, travel alerts, and the international situation in general have exacerbated the crisis. “All of this is having an impact, and we’re feeling it hard,” he concluded, according to La Jornada.
Prior to the holiday closure, the Quintana Roo Tourism Secretariat (Sedetur) issued its official hotel occupancy report, which, overall, for the Mexican Caribbean is 63.7 percent for the period from August 16 to 22, a figure that remained stable compared to the previous week. (The Riviera Maya and Tulum are suffering from lower occupancy than Cancún.)
Of these just over 63 percentage points, 70.7 percent were for Costa Mujeres, 68 percent for Cancún, 61.2 percent for the Riviera Maya, 60.4 percent for Isla Mujeres, while 59.2 percent were reported for Puerto Morelos, 53.3 percent for Tulum, and 56.7 percent for Costa Maya; the region with the lowest hotel occupancy is Cozumel, with 50.2 percent.
Source: reportur
