Cancun Today

Aeromexico is taking a lesson from cell phone companies by introducing its own version of a family plan. Buy three or four tickets depending on where you are flying on select routes between the U.S. and Mexico and receive one ticket — for an adult or a child — for free. Some destinations included in this offer are Los Cabos, Guadalajara, Cancun, Leon, Monterrey, and Mexico City.

via Free family flights to Mexico on AeroMexico – Deals- msnbc.com.

QUINTANA ROO, Mexico, June 4, 2009 (ENS) – To establish Mexico as a global model for conservation, a new alliance today announced an initial investment of US$100 million for the promotion of sustainable development and protection of biodiversity in six priority regions. The global conservation group WWF, along with the foundation established by telecommunications tycoon Carlos Slim, and the Mexican federal government, launched the initiative to support conservation in areas of exceptional natural richness. Continue Reading »

By Chris Gray Faust, USA TODAY

In Cancun, most hotels and resorts are offering packages and deals to boost occupancy rates that dropped as low as 20% in early May. The bargains seem to be having an effect: The occupancy rate for Cancun’s hotel zone rose to 43% over Memorial Day weekend, but those numbers are still far from the 85% posted at the same time in 2008.

“Our main concern is to bring back the airlines,” says Jesus Almaguer, CEO of the Cancun Convention & Visitors Bureau. While several American carriers cut their capacity, large European tour operators such as Thomas Cook canceled all trips until this past week — leading Cancun to lose an estimated $20 million every five days for much of May, Almaguer says.

Besides increasing airlift, the Cancun visitors bureau has been filming testimonials from visitors already in Mexico, hoping that word of mouth will entice last-minute summer bookings. Europeans have long booked holidays with little lead time; since the economic downturn last year, Americans and Canadians have adopted similar patterns, Almaguer says.

“We expect the numbers to get higher by July,” he says.

Go to original in USAToday.

Noted right wing savants such as Glenn Beck and Michelle Bachmann seem to think the White House inflamed the swine flu crisis in order to fast track Kathleen Sibelius for Secretary of Health and Human Services. Maybe they are on to something, but not in the way they think.

A lot of this just doesn’t seem to hang together very well. First of all, although travelers from Cancun (where I live) have been diagnosed with swine flu, there is one confirmed swine flu in Cancun. I will repeat that. There is exactly one confirmed swine flu in Cancun. One case. Is that just aporcalypto (as Mexicans are now calling it), or what? In fact, despite being called a pandemic, there really aren’t a lot of cases anywhere in the world, not even in Mexico City. So it would be understandable to wonder why total hazmat anti-terror precautions have been unleashed.

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Interestingly, no cases have yet been reported in Cancun, raising the question of how the visitors who were diagnosed with the virus on returning home contracted it. Perhaps they got it from travelers visiting here from other destinations in Mexico, such as Mexico City. Despite this, the Cancun Hotel Zone is now almost completely tourist-free. In town, an occasional person is seen with a surgical mask. All taxi drivers are required to wear them, but I haven’t seen them on bus drivers yet.

As in the rest of the nation, public events and facilities will be suspended from May 1-6, except for vital services such as food and transportation. Many government offices are already closed or offering only restricted service, such as emergency tourist card replacements. Business people I talk with here feel (understandably) that authorities are overreacting in an excess of caution, as very few cases of actual swine flu have been identified, especially given the population of Mexico City. Let’s hope they are right.

Yahoo! News Alerts feed

CNews, Thu, 30 Apr 2009 02:32 AM PDT
Swine flu victims unaware of exposure
Three young Port Perry women who are Ontario’s first confirmed cases of swine flu returned from Cancun on Friday with symptoms but spent the weekend at the local casino and visiting friends because their local hospital never advised them to stay home.

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It is expected that Gustav will be a powerful hurricane as it moves into the southern Gulf of Mexico on Sunday. Southwesterly vertical wind shear could increase late in the period when the system is forecast to be in the northern Gulf but there is considerably uncertainty at that time. –Tropical Storm Gustav Discussion Number 13

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