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[url=http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/cuba-u-s-relations-normalization-could-mean-boosted-tourism-n288996]According to NBC News:[/url]
“Tour guides, hotel clerks, restaurant owners, taxi drivers — they’re all readying for what they hope will be a big influx in the number of American visitors now that President Obama has relaxed many restrictions on travel to the communist island. That bold decision was part of a bigger White House effort to restore relations with Cuba, chilled since the Kennedy era, and one day open a U.S. embassy in Havana.”
With U.S. Cuba relations ‘restored’ how do you think this will affect tourism in Costa Rica?
I would love to hear your thoughts and opinions?
I think it will impact Costa Rica greatly, if only for a short time. Tourists will want to say [i]’we’ve just returned from Cuba…’ [/i]and depending on their experience, whether they would do it again or recommend it to others. This travel destination has been a popular trip from Canada for many years.
Many will go just to see the old vehicles…Just the short and possibly inexpensive trip makes it possible for a weekend or overnight mini-vacation. 8) from many areas in the USA.
Well, it’s about time that we normalized relations with Cuba. Even though I’m no friend of socialist-communist regimes, I have to admire Cuba and Fidel for sticking it to the United States and its termites in Washington D.C. But if the U.S. thinks that it can go back to the pre-Castro doing business as usual routine, then it’s in for a rude shock. It will be an interesting situation knowing that the average Cuban makes $20.00 a month, and what American businesses will outsource to Cuba, furthering more U.S. job losses. Of particular interest will also be real estate in the beach areas of Cuba, which will put pressure on Costa Rica’s overpriced Guanacaste and Puntarenas locations. Cuba as we know, is an island, with absolutely gorgeous beaches. Will one be able to buy a house in Cuba with a beach view or on the beach for $50-$75,000.00? And just 90 miles away from Florida! I bet you a lot of mouths are watering.:P
Between Cuba and Nicarugua new canel.. costa rica damn well be worried.
why??
because these countries are hungry
hungry for new change as well as the opportunity to get some tourism dollars
Cuba has hotels that need to be remodeled as well as built but also many of the smaller type of places that are available.
I have lived in Cuba for a year and it was a great experience
Think about it
if you had a choice to visit
Costa Rica or Cuba
which would it be??
Cuba has been closed for so long that people will go for that experience.
Don’t forget it is only the US that does not allow most travel to Cuba. The rest of the world does vacation there. After the collapse of the Soviet Union the Cuban government developed hotels, restored old resorts in an effort to bolster tourism. That said they mostly try and keep tourists away from most of the local population.I have read that they receive approximately 3,000,000 tourists per year.
[quote=”sweikert925″]If I were the head of the Costa Rican tourism office, I would be concerned, but not overly worried. While the demand for tours to Cuba will certainly go up in light of President Obama’s decision, there will probably be no flood of new tourists there since those tourists need hotels to stay at and hotels don’t just sprout up overnight. How many new ones get built and who gets to operate them is still under the control of the Cuban government.
Oh, and don’t get your hopes up about beachfront property for $50,000 either – the Cuban government also still gets to decide about who is able to purchase property there and I strongly doubt they will allow rich gringos to buy up all that beachfront land.[/quote]
Not quite, Sweikert.
Having been there 6 times I can tell you there is no shortage of luxury hotels and luxury hotel rooms! While us Yanks and the Brits have been punishing the poor people of Cuba, many other countries have been active building over the years.
I would say it would be a close race between Cuba and CR as to the number of luxury hotel rooms.
Cuba is home to Paradisus Resorts, Melia, Barcelo, Royalton, Iberostar, Rio Resorts – all of which have 2, 3 or more resorts. Plus there are hotels by SofHotel and others European and Asian flags.
I don’t disagree that US citizens will flock there initially, it is a great place to visit and the people are wonderful. But remember, there are several months a year that Cuba is threatened by hurricanes and when they get hit, the recovery time is much longer than in the States – and unfortunately Cuba gets more than their share of tropical storms and hurricanes.
It might also be of interest for you to learn that it is now legal for Cubans and foreign nationals to own real estate in Cuba. There are not only real estate offices, but real estate ads in the media!
There have been 2 flights a week from several Florida cities into Havana for the past couple of years.costaricabill
As much as it pains me..and believe me it hurts.. it hurts!!
8)8) I have to agree with sweikerts assesment.Cuba can no way handle a large influx of tourism from the Americanos 🙂
Having lived in Cuba I have seen first hand the conditions of most of the buildings and establishments there which are OK
but if you add in the American tourist expectations on how things should be. I can see many pissed off people that would never go there on vacation again
add this to the general malaise of latinos.. and yo have a recipe for disaster.
first impressions count
hopefully tourism will grow at a manageable level.
heck I may even contact cuban officials and offer my services
[quote=”sweikert925″]I will bow to your superior knowledge on the subject of hotels, but I still have my doubts that Cuba has enough accommodation capacity to handle a tripling or quadrupling (or even more) of the number of tourists that it currently receives. If only 3% of the tourists that visit Florida go to Cuba too (or instead) that alone would double the number of tourists to Cuba. Are you saying they can currently handle that much of an increase?
As to real estate, I was unaware that the laws in Cuba [url=http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/reports/2014/02/21%20cuba%20real%20estate/phil%20peters%20cubas%20new%20real%20estate%20market.pdf]had recently changed to allow private ownership of real estate.[/url] However, per that report:
[i]”The opening of Cuba’s real estate market prompts many to ask whether foreign nationals and Cubans living abroad can now buy property in Cuba. In a word, the answer is ‘no.'”[/i][/quote]
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