American Visitors to Cancun, Riviera Maya Surpass Pre-Pandemic Levels

Quintana Roo Governor Carlos Joaquin Gonzalez announced popular destinations like Cancun and Riviera Maya welcomed a higher number of American tourists during the 2021 summer holiday travel season than before the coronavirus pandemic struck.

According to the Riviera Maya News, Joaquin Gonzalez said data from the Quintana Roo Tourism Promotion Council (CPTQ) and the National Migration Institute (INM) announced 38 percent more travelers from the United States arrived in the Mexican state this year than in 2019.

As part of the Quintana Roo’s reactivation plan, Joaquin Gonzalez reported that Cancun International Airport hosted more than 500 daily flights and the average hotel occupancy rate for the state was 62 percent in the northern region and 30 percent in the south.

“The COVID-19 pandemic hit us hard because at the worst time, flights fell to just 14 a day and hotel occupancy rates plummeted to four percent,” Joaquin Gonzalez told the Riviera Maya News.

The Quintana Roo Governor also reported more than 80.5 million travelers visited the state during his four-year term as governor, expanding the Mexican Caribbean’s reputation as a highly sought-after global destination.

In addition to the numbers presented by Joaquin Gonzalez, the CPTQ announced Quintana Roo has received 9.3 million visitors between July 2020 and July 2021, with around 70 percent of the 4.9 million international tourists being American.

Last week, the Mexican Secretary of Tourism (SECTUR) revealed that more than 120,000 tourists remain in the Mexican state even though the summer holidays have officially ended.

Earlier this month, the Secretariat de Comunicaciones y Transportes (SCT) announced the five largest carriers in the U.S. transported 2.3 million passengers to and from Mexico in July, the highest on record.