Gay Nagle Myers
Mexico saw record hotel occupancy for the first four months of the year, chalking up a 7.6% increase over the same period in 2011, according to the Ministry of Tourism.
From Jan. 1 through April 29, a total of 185,550 guestrooms were booked. Mexico’s 70 leading destinations posted occupancy numbers that exceeded those of 2008, the barometer by which all other years since have been measured.
Tourism destinations that saw “important growth,” according to ministry officials, included the Riviera Maya and Puerto Vallarta, posting increases of 6.3% and 20.1%, respectively.
Huatulco, on the Pacific coast, registered a 13% jump in the hotel occupancy rate; Cancun posted a 10.8% rise; and Loreto and Los Cabos had increases of 10.5% and 3.4%, respectively.
The country’s largest cities, Mexico City and Guadalajara, saw occupancy increases of 10.6% and 13.3%, respectively, while colonial cities such as Villahermosa, Guanajuato, Queretaro, San Luis Potosi and Leon also enjoyed double-digit percentage increases.