INteresting Stats

I fully realize that people living full time at the Lake could care less if the area is drawing additional visitors but I ran across some interesting figures that speak to the current situation. As a member of TripAdvisor, I get weekly updates on the number of travelers doing research on areas where I have written articles or provided reviews. A recent update indicated that 103 travelers had researched the Lake Chapala area over the last week but in the same update, 1640 travelers had researched Morelia.

I find this somewhat interesting given the negative reputation that Morelia and Michoacan have been subjected to over the past couple of years!

It's likely people are researching Morelia/Michoacan because of their (as you put it) negative reputation, before committing to a trip there.

We think the State of Michoacan is one of the most interesting in all of MX, but have delayed return visits due to the problems in certain areas there.

We look at news reports and postings and hope to return this winter, as things seem more settled than they were a year ago.

What makes it so interesting? I think Yucatan, Chiapas, Oaxaca, Guerrero. Morelos, Guanajuato, Puebla , Jalisco and many other are at least as interesting if not more.
Brigitte

If anyone thinks they are doing research on the situation in Michoacan by going to TripAdvisor, they are in for a real surprise. It is tough enough to find accurate news by reading the local media.

We would agree with you about Michoacan as it is one of our favorites. Since we were planning to make a trip there back in August, I did my due diligence trying to grasp the situation. Once satisfied, we made a visit from 8/16 to 8/23. While admittedly there were certain towns or areas we stayed away from, we pretty much went where we wanted and we certainly didn't follow the US State Dept. advice to only drive on the cuotas. We didn't experience any negatives but must admit there were some isolated incidents in the general area during our visit. The most obvious thing to us was that there were literally no tourists out and about in Patzcuaro. We have visited Patzcuaro during the month of August in past years, so it was a direct comparison. The entire time we were in or around Patzcuaro, we only saw one Japanese couple, no Europeans and no non local Americans or Canadians. It was a shame to see as it is negatively affecting restaurants, hotels and other businesses.

This drop in tourism is not simply a phenomenon affecting Pátzcuaro and other parts of Michoacan. We just drove from Lake Chapala via the Veracruz coast to Chiapas and found the area in serious depression with perhaps less that 10% of their usual tourist visits and then mostly Mexican tourists and only on weekends. We had the hotels we stayed in virtually to ourselves during the week. We also drove along isolated beach highways between Tecolutla and Veracruz City through areas experiencing extreme recent violence and observed no killings nor corruption nor head rolling but that doesn´t mean it´s safe - just that we were lucky and the luck of the draw is you are not likely to come upon mass murder scenes just because they are occurring all around you. It proves nothing that one takes a drive over the back roads of Michoacan - which we have often done - or the back roads of Veracruz and experiences no violence.

While we don´t stay away from many of our old haunts from West Central to Southern Mexico, I wouldn´t advise others unfamiliar with those areas to drive to a number of them at the present time. As Neil knows, on our recent trip from Ajijic to New Mexico, we flew rather than drove through the Chihuahua or Sonora wilderness areas near the U.S. border and, until this virtual insurrection in parts of Mexico is mitigated or over, I wouldn´t advise a friend to drive in many areas of those states or many areas of Jalisco or Michoacan either.

Actually, and paradoxically, we feel safer here in Chiapas than we felt when still in the Chapala area but that doesn´t mean we are safe - just that we feel safer because the news sources in Mexico are so unreliable and law enforcement and the judicial process so scary.

I can say this without hesitation. We´ve lived in Mexico, both at Lake Chapala and in the Chiapas Highlands for over ten years and, barring any unforeseen problems preventing the culmination of our plans, will probably live here the rest of our lives but if we were looking at retirement places today with all this violence and serious corruption in Mexico, we´d retire to France even if it is too expensive and cold in the winter. However, since we love this country, have achieved permanent residency (inmigrado) status and own property in Mexico and I have a mother-in-law in France, we´ll try to stay here. The one thing we do know for sure is that we will try to avoid the United States like the plague. You think it´s scary down here , try being a banker in Downtown Oakland like Dawg was for over ten years. Talk about scary.

All true, dawg. The reasons for the downturn in tourism are probably beyond the actual and perceived violence. The San Miguel forum reported that tourism there is down 70% from a very few years ago. Shops are closing. Since it's perceived as a relatively safe place, perhaps the downturn is more attributable to the world's financial troubles. Money for touring is disposable income, and we all know that's down for only too many people.

Don't know how the weather in Chiapas is........but it's just gorgeous here. Last week was another whole story, though.

Gringal:

What you expressed about San Miguel de Allende was a confirmation of what we experienced while spending three nights there in August. Not nearly as obvious as the situation in Patzcuaro since we did see a few more travelers but closed shops, closed restaurants or people who just didn't bother opening for the day were the norm. Up until, this week's TripAdvisor report, I had been getting figures for San Miguel de Allende and other spots in Guanajuato State and they had been running about eight to ten times the number for the Lake Chapala area.

Quoting Brigitte: "I think Yucatan, Chiapas, Oaxaca, Guerrero. Morelos, Guanajuato, Puebla , Jalisco and many other are at least as interesting if not more."
With the exception of Guanajuato and Jalisco, we haven't had the opportunity to visit the others, so we cannot say that each doesn't have interesting things or aspects. However, based upon our experiences so far and our interests, we have liked Michoacan but that is an ever involving opinion.

gringal wrote:Don't know how the weather in Chiapas is........but it's just gorgeous here. Last week was another whole story, though.

Well, Gringal, today was quite nice and in San Cristóbal and actually quite warm for a town at 2,000 meters. I´d say highs this afternoon as we did our downtown stroll, at least in the mid 70s Fahrenheit. The principal plaza and pedestrian malls were filled with people who had been depressed as early as yesterday with the incessant, unseasonable rain for days on end and also unseasonable coollish temperatures.


We strolled down to Centro to se what was going on in the plaza with the convention of "adventure" travel business promoters in town and I´ll talk about that in a thread I started on the All Mexico Forum I have previously discussed here. Please join us there if you are interested. Chiapas, like Rick Perry´s Texas is the land of mutual back scratching amongst the connected and, as Jesus said,the poor will always be amongst us as well but may be hard to find when they are being promoted by those who would ride their backs to fame.

My point is that there is a lot of interesting states in Mexico. Right now we are having a big tourist promotion of MIndigenous Mexico in San Cristobal de las Casas, with indigenous from all over the Republica giving people information on various parts of Mexico. Some very intresting and some less.
I picked up some good information for future trips.
The interesting part of the conference attracting travel agents from all over the world is that the city kicked out the local indigenous from around the the Santo Domingo Church to clean up the place and have a better image.

I thought it was pretty hypocritical of the city fathers to deprive these people who are so poor from 4 days of sales for a conference. It has rained for 5 straight weeks and tourism has been nil, today the conference started, the sun is shinning and a whole bunch of very poor people have been deprived of their livelyhood for a conference promoting them......go figure, I guess thy are a little too real.

Meanwhile there was nice music on the plaza and the area around Santo Domingo looked very good. It will be interesting to see if the vendors will be back in 4 days as the government has been trying to kick them out for quite a while.

Another interesting statistic, albeit promoted by the press, is that Mexico has actually experienced an upsurge in the number of tourists this year. Now there may be a number of reasons for this. Tourist resorts may be benefitting from the weaker peso, and the press reporting that these areas are safe. Whereas Central Mexico may be experiencing a downturn due to perceptions generated by the very same press.

Promoted by the press and the Mexican Tourism Dept. true but one really needs to analyze their statistics and motivations. When one reads about these upticks, they rarely provide a baseline for comparison and they most often are based upon areas that can attract large numbers of foreign tourists. I certainly wouldn't question that the coastal resorts of Puerta Vallarta, Manzanillo, Mazatlan, Baja California, Cancun, Cozumel, etc are probably experiencing positive booking figures but Acapulco is now a "dead zone". While the immediate local economies are benefiting, one needs to keep in mind that a good part of the overall revenue is being skimmed off by foreign corporations, foreign investors and horror of horrors, the drug cartels operating semi legit enterprises. There is virtually no "trickle down" to the other parts (majority) of Mexico.

When one reads that tourism (foreign and Mexican) is down 70% in San Miguel de Allende since 2007 or that Tonala has lost 40% of their artisans - these are the realities facing the Country of Mexico as a whole! Tonala is hard to read since all one sees is shops and stands everywhere but these are all being fed by far fewer artisans and that doesn't speak well for the tradition of passing down from one family member to the next. It is this tradition that has kept the arts and crafts of Mexico alive for so many years. Even the upscale Tlaquepaque has undergone a noticeable transformation over the last couple of years. Fewer shops replaced with numerous new restaurants was quite obvious. If they keep dumping the shops, they will get to the point that they will limit the reasons for going there and the Tlaquepaque artisans will either go on to other ventures or move somewhere where they can continue with their crafts and expect to make a living.

Lake Chapala area has never been a tourist destination in the way that Puerto Vallarta or Cancun have been. Folks visit here with an eye to retirement not vacationing. I'm not surprised that tourism is down in Morelia and Patzcuaro and similar lesser known places due to concerns about security. San Miguel is in the same boat as Lakeside, waiting for the retirees from NOB. It is what it is. Maybe unfortunate but true.

CheenaGringo wrote:Promoted by the press and the Mexican Tourism Dept. true but one really needs to analyze their statistics and motivations. When one reads about these upticks, they rarely provide a baseline for comparison and they most often are based upon areas that can attract large numbers of foreign tourists. I certainly wouldn't question that the coastal resorts of Puerta Vallarta, Manzanillo, Mazatlan, Baja California, Cancun, Cozumel, etc are probably experiencing positive booking figures but Acapulco is now a "dead zone". While the immediate local economies are benefiting, one needs to keep in mind that a good part of the overall revenue is being skimmed off by foreign corporations, foreign investors and horror of horrors, the drug cartels operating semi legit enterprises. There is virtually no "trickle down" to the other parts (majority) of Mexico.

When one reads that tourism (foreign and Mexican) is down 70% in San Miguel de Allende since 2007 or that Tonala has lost 40% of their artisans - these are the realities facing the Country of Mexico as a whole! Tonala is hard to read since all one sees is shops and stands everywhere but these are all being fed by far fewer artisans and that doesn't speak well for the tradition of passing down from one family member to the next. It is this tradition that has kept the arts and crafts of Mexico alive for so many years. Even the upscale Tlaquepaque has undergone a noticeable transformation over the last couple of years. Fewer shops replaced with numerous new restaurants was quite obvious. If they keep dumping the shops, they will get to the point that they will limit the reasons for going there and the Tlaquepaque artisans will either go on to other ventures or move somewhere where they can continue with their crafts and expect to make a living.

The press can certainly spin a story as you point out. We recently visited Tonala which was pretty quiet, many former vendors missing and the pewter shop seemed to be smaller, with less inventory. I haven't recently been to Tlaquepaque, but will need to visit soon for some new traditional light fixtures. Hope our favorite shop is still there.

Cheers.

Quoting David: "Lake Chapala area has never been a tourist destination in the way that Puerto Vallarta or Cancun have been. Folks visit here with an eye to retirement not vacationing. I'm not surprised that tourism is down in Morelia and Patzcuaro and similar lesser known places due to concerns about security. San Miguel is in the same boat as Lakeside, waiting for the retirees from NOB. It is what it is. Maybe unfortunate but true."

In the past when I have made one of my "myopic generalizations" about the Lake Chapala area being a retirement spot for Gringos and not much more, people have come to the defense of the community by pointing out all of the Mexicans who visit the area as tourists. Apparently there is some disagreement on just what the area is? As to equating the Lake Chapala area with San Miguel de Allende, I would have to disagree. Sure there is a similarity due to the Gringo retirees but San Miguel de Allende has typically enjoyed a far great tourist trade comprised of foreign and Mexican tourists. As near as I can figure, San Miguel de Allende has somewhere between 50 and 100 hotels, 60+ B & B's and 2 to 3 times the number of restaurants. I hardly think that these facilities are all waiting for retirees from NOB nor will they survive if that is their intent.

It has often been stated in the past that "tourism" has been either the second or third largest source of income or revenue for the entire Country of Mexico but I am now questioning where that figure is today?

Neil, I'd agree that SMA is more of a tourist destination than Lakeside. Many folks around here think that the Tapatios that visit here on weekends and Holidays are "tourists." I suppose that some are but many are simply visiting their "weekend homes." e.g. the majority of the homes in La Floresta and The Raquet Club are owned by Tapatios. Many other areas too have a high percentage of absentee owners. I'll hold that these folks are not tourists but rather part-time residents.

San Miguel is a tourist destination for people from Mexico City, among many others. They're there to shop, eat and just relax. It's under a three hour drive, doable for a weekend getaway. When we lived there, we avoided downtown on weekends.......for good reason.

Cancun, Playa del Carmen, Tulum and Cozumel are all seeing high numbers this year but it's a highly promoted tourist area with big dollars being spent. Also you can stay at the all inclusives for cheap, there trading todays profits for future returns they hope and it keeps everyone employed.
I have a friend selling vacation intervels over there and he tells me their 98-100% booked all summer in low season because of the screaming deals to get folks to come down.

In San Cristobal, tourism is up a little but busmisses are going out. This week they had a 4 day international conference for travel agents. Everything was paid by the government and the attendees spent no money in town. The restaurants were deserted but the streets full. All the ambulantes had been kick out so no money for them either.
The businesses were hoping a few would stay over the week-end but it is gloomy businesswise.

http://travel.usatoday.com/destinations/dispatches/post/2011/10/30-million-ad-campaign-says-mexico-is-safe/556122/1

In the above article, it announces a new $30M ad campaign called the Mexico Taxi Project. While the article doesn't say it, my bet is that the emphasis will once again be on the popular resort areas.

There was great set of 4-6 HD commercials filmed a couple months back by our dear Pres. of Mexico highlighting the entire country. I saw 2-3 of them and they were totally positive to drive tourism to the cultural and historical Mexico

Larry:

I am not sure if you are referring to the PBS Royal Tour Special but if you have not seen it, there are links to all four parts on this forum:
http://lakechapalainfo.forumotion.net/t2318p15-pbs-special-on-mexico
It was split into four parts on YouTube and if you scroll down, all four parts are there.

hound dog wrote:In San Cristobal, tourism is up a little but busmisses are going out. This week they had a 4 day international conference for travel agents. Everything was paid by the government and the attendees spent no money in town. The restaurants were deserted but the streets full. All the ambulantes had been kick out so no money for them either.
The businesses were hoping a few would stay over the week-end but it is gloomy businesswise.

I noticed that Morelia was also a lot more quiet than usual as well, and some of my favorite shops in Centro were gone.