Tourists and residents have worry-free attitude about the resort city
Old Mazatlan takes on a golden glow as the sun sets.
Photograph by: Handout photo , Tourism Mazatalan
To the sunbathing tourists and the half-million people who live here, the cruise ships are mere specs on the ocean.
Until four years ago, the mammoth boats docked in Mazatlan's busy port where tourists would pour into the city to cram the downtown Mazatlan market or visit the Golden Zone restaurants where they'd eat shrimp and sip fish-bowl-sized margaritas with a view of the Pacific. They'd buy jewelry, T-shirts and other trinkets before returning to the port where fresh tourists had arrived.
But those days are over. The cruise ships can only be seen inching across the horizon on their way to stopovers in South America, Mexico and the United States where tourists aren't nervous about getting caught in the crossfire of Mexico's escalating drug wars.
Mazatlan's tourism industry has taken its lumps. The swine flu epidemic halted most Mexico-bound planes from Canada in 2009 before violent feuds between drug cartels and Mexican police erupted across the country, particularly along its border with the U.S. Mazatlan itself has suffered more than most because of violent incidents that made headlines in Canadian news-papers.
Because of a struggling economy in the United States, news of the beating of a Calgary tourist at an upscale resort this winter and an uncommonly mild winter in Canada, the tourist season in Mazatlan is the worst it's experienced in a generation.
But despite the grim out-look, there are thousands of worry-free Canadians and Americans who dot the postcard-worthy beaches and dine on fresh seafood and order Mexican beer served in icy metal buckets.
Tourists here argue that Mazatlan shares similar rates of crime that have made parts of any North American city unsafe. Fearing the worst is just silly, they say.
"The problem is that the only people who are scared are people who've never been here," says Denise Connor of Calgary from her beach chair at Hotel Playa Mazatlan, where she's spending two weeks with husband Keith.
"People see headlines in the paper and that's all they see. There are parts of Calgary I'd never visit after midnight either. I'd get killed just as easy."
Fellow vacationer Myles Simcoe of Richmond, B.C. has been coming to Mazatlan "on and off for 20 years" and has yet to feel unsafe or witness any criminal activity.
"My wife and I walk to the restaurants at night. And we're always treated very well. Not just by the people who work in the hotel or bars, but by the regular Mexicans," said Simcoe. "In Vancouver, I'm not out buying or selling drugs or going to places I've been told not to go either."
Much of the scuttle-butt on the beach this season surrounds the attack on the Calgary woman at Hotel Riu Emerald Bay. Sheila Nabb is recovering in Calgary from her injuries suffered in a beating while at the resort.
Few people in Mazatlan understand this city's struggles better than Lance Vient, manager of the Playa Mazatlan Hotel.
Vient is the Mazatlan-born grandson of California contractor Ulysses Solomon who built the hotel in 1952 and helped make Mazatlan one of the top Mexican tourist destinations.
Until four years ago, the mammoth boats docked in Mazatlan's busy port where tourists would pour into the city to cram the downtown Mazatlan market or visit the Golden Zone restaurants where they'd eat shrimp and sip fish-bowl-sized margaritas with a view of the Pacific. They'd buy jewelry, T-shirts and other trinkets before returning to the port where fresh tourists had arrived.
But those days are over. The cruise ships can only be seen inching across the horizon on their way to stopovers in South America, Mexico and the United States where tourists aren't nervous about getting caught in the crossfire of Mexico's escalating drug wars.
Mazatlan's tourism industry has taken its lumps. The swine flu epidemic halted most Mexico-bound planes from Canada in 2009 before violent feuds between drug cartels and Mexican police erupted across the country, particularly along its border with the U.S. Mazatlan itself has suffered more than most because of violent incidents that made headlines in Canadian news-papers.
Because of a struggling economy in the United States, news of the beating of a Calgary tourist at an upscale resort this winter and an uncommonly mild winter in Canada, the tourist season in Mazatlan is the worst it's experienced in a generation.
But despite the grim out-look, there are thousands of worry-free Canadians and Americans who dot the postcard-worthy beaches and dine on fresh seafood and order Mexican beer served in icy metal buckets.
Tourists here argue that Mazatlan shares similar rates of crime that have made parts of any North American city unsafe. Fearing the worst is just silly, they say.
"The problem is that the only people who are scared are people who've never been here," says Denise Connor of Calgary from her beach chair at Hotel Playa Mazatlan, where she's spending two weeks with husband Keith.
"People see headlines in the paper and that's all they see. There are parts of Calgary I'd never visit after midnight either. I'd get killed just as easy."
Fellow vacationer Myles Simcoe of Richmond, B.C. has been coming to Mazatlan "on and off for 20 years" and has yet to feel unsafe or witness any criminal activity.
"My wife and I walk to the restaurants at night. And we're always treated very well. Not just by the people who work in the hotel or bars, but by the regular Mexicans," said Simcoe. "In Vancouver, I'm not out buying or selling drugs or going to places I've been told not to go either."
Much of the scuttle-butt on the beach this season surrounds the attack on the Calgary woman at Hotel Riu Emerald Bay. Sheila Nabb is recovering in Calgary from her injuries suffered in a beating while at the resort.
Few people in Mazatlan understand this city's struggles better than Lance Vient, manager of the Playa Mazatlan Hotel.
Vient is the Mazatlan-born grandson of California contractor Ulysses Solomon who built the hotel in 1952 and helped make Mazatlan one of the top Mexican tourist destinations.
Over the years, the Playa expanded from a 40-room hotel to the sprawling, 400-room resort that takes up about a quarter-mile of beach front, the longest of any hotel in the city. In previous decades, the Playa Mazatlan regularly hosted winter visits from Hollywood elite including John Wayne, Tony Curtis and Rock Hudson.
Since then, it's welcomed millions who come for the sun, the area's history and popular tourist activities like parasailing, horseback riding and four-wheeling.
Before this year, there were 15,000 Canadian tourists in Mazatlan between November and March, Mexican tourist figures show.
Vient left for the United States as a young man but returned to turn the hotel around.
"What we can do to stop the hotel from tanking is tell people about the reality of Mazatlan," said Vient, 32, who moved his wife and three young daughters from Arizona to accept an offer from his family to run the hotel in 2010.
Vient hopes his American-style marketing experience and familiarity with social media will help encourage Canadians and Americans to return to Mazatlan, where occupancy rates have dipped as low as 20 percent. Rooms that went for as much as $200 a night are now offered at $75 - discount hotels a few minutes from the beach have rooms for as low as $25 a night.
He knows it's a tough sell. Down the street from the Playa Mazatlan, near-empty seafood restaurants offer deep discounts, large jewelry shops are boarded up and tourists have plenty of elbow room as they stroll along the sidewalks.
Vient acknowledges that drug crime in Mazatlan and Mexico has increased in recent years, but he argues the Mazatlan crime rate is still low compared to other resort communities. He also argues that visitors face risks no different than they do at home.
"I'd be lying if I said there weren't things going on.
That would be unfair," said Vient, whose hotel features security guards who keep an eye on the hotel beachfront 24 hours a day.
"If you start focusing only on the negative things about a place, then you'd never go to Disneyland. You'd never go to Los Angeles, which is something like the third biggest crime-ridden city in the U.S. and people go there all the time."
Vient is helping the city and the state of Sinaloa with marketing campaigns to help improve its image, and he's also working with local schools to help improve education and teach Mexican culture in hopes of steering them clear of a life of crime.
"We want to teach our children values and to have pride in their Mexican culture . . . if we don't educate our kids, we lose our next generations."
Vient said his decision to move to Mazatlan with his family is the ultimate proof of his confidence in Mazatlan.
"The quality of my life has improved dramatically. I can walk on the beach. I can walk my dog. I can play golf for $10 and I can eat out at restaurants and eat steak and lobster for $40. This is a beautiful place," he said.
"They call Mexico the pearl of the Pacific. We're still the pearl but we're just a little bit tarnished."
Since then, it's welcomed millions who come for the sun, the area's history and popular tourist activities like parasailing, horseback riding and four-wheeling.
Before this year, there were 15,000 Canadian tourists in Mazatlan between November and March, Mexican tourist figures show.
Vient left for the United States as a young man but returned to turn the hotel around.
"What we can do to stop the hotel from tanking is tell people about the reality of Mazatlan," said Vient, 32, who moved his wife and three young daughters from Arizona to accept an offer from his family to run the hotel in 2010.
Vient hopes his American-style marketing experience and familiarity with social media will help encourage Canadians and Americans to return to Mazatlan, where occupancy rates have dipped as low as 20 percent. Rooms that went for as much as $200 a night are now offered at $75 - discount hotels a few minutes from the beach have rooms for as low as $25 a night.
He knows it's a tough sell. Down the street from the Playa Mazatlan, near-empty seafood restaurants offer deep discounts, large jewelry shops are boarded up and tourists have plenty of elbow room as they stroll along the sidewalks.
Vient acknowledges that drug crime in Mazatlan and Mexico has increased in recent years, but he argues the Mazatlan crime rate is still low compared to other resort communities. He also argues that visitors face risks no different than they do at home.
"I'd be lying if I said there weren't things going on.
That would be unfair," said Vient, whose hotel features security guards who keep an eye on the hotel beachfront 24 hours a day.
"If you start focusing only on the negative things about a place, then you'd never go to Disneyland. You'd never go to Los Angeles, which is something like the third biggest crime-ridden city in the U.S. and people go there all the time."
Vient is helping the city and the state of Sinaloa with marketing campaigns to help improve its image, and he's also working with local schools to help improve education and teach Mexican culture in hopes of steering them clear of a life of crime.
"We want to teach our children values and to have pride in their Mexican culture . . . if we don't educate our kids, we lose our next generations."
Vient said his decision to move to Mazatlan with his family is the ultimate proof of his confidence in Mazatlan.
"The quality of my life has improved dramatically. I can walk on the beach. I can walk my dog. I can play golf for $10 and I can eat out at restaurants and eat steak and lobster for $40. This is a beautiful place," he said.
"They call Mexico the pearl of the Pacific. We're still the pearl but we're just a little bit tarnished."
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