Hola from Puerto Adventura, located on the so called Mayan Riviera, Mexico.
Progress can of course take many forms and can mean many things to different people. We first visited this area over ten years ago when we were able to happily escape the confines of a cruise ship at Playa des Carmen and catch a bus south to visit the coastal Mayan city of Tulum. As I recall, we felt somewhat adventurous as we bumped along on a poor section of road in search of a bit of history. Playa was generally a quiet town consisting of a few shops and was fairly typical of the area, with few roads paved...most not. We brought along a little fruit, some water and of course a couple of cold beers for the 2 hour bus trip south. As we rolled and bumped along I can recall how impressed we were that this road was in the process of a serious up-grade. There were big squares of concrete being poured for road base all the way along, with dirt roads running off towards the sea with signage proclaiming the future home of some resort. There were many of these, but mostly we followed a road along a coastline un-mared by buildings, with exceptional ocean vistas at the foot of long sweeps of undeveloped, untouched Yucatan greenery.
Fast forward 10 years...what a change! Quiet Playa has been replaced with all the trappings, complete with a Senior Frogs, a Wal Mart, Starbucks and traffic congestion. The roads are all paved and curbed. The occasional shop has been replaced with 5th Street which is full of the usual trinket stops carrying Mexican goods, and I suspect others made even further afield. Playa has grown to the point where it is larger than Cancun Town and attracts workers from all over Mexico. On a trip to Cancun about 7 years ago, we found many of the workers were more local, but with explosive development this has quickly changed. For example, we met trained staff at our accommodation from France and Brazil. The coast line is now a never ending line of 'all-inclusive' resorts, over priced condo developments and theme 'adventure' parks. It really has changed the landscape and one wonders what the future will look like. Construction is already underway to build a LRT system running from Cancun down along the highway past Tulum, designed to quickly transport tourists and workers to the various resorts and sites.
All this development has generated considerable employment in Mexico and has put hard currency into the hands of many locals. It has also raised the cost of living for those same locals and one wonders how they are managing. I can't answer this question. I still see the local people as largely friendly and appreciative of the employment in the area. And certainly it is a nice place to spend a week in the sun with seemingly endless numbers of other Canadians and Europeans. Clearly one thing has changed...this is not the 'real' Mexico and one would have to travel a ways to find it in this area. But I know its out there cause we've seen it before...just not on this trip.
On a separate note...we lost a dear and special member of our family yesterday when Auntie Barb passed away. She touched our hearts.
