On holiday in Mexico's murder capital - what it's really like down in Acapulco
As a toddler clinked together a bucket and spade in childish approval of the nearby three-piece mariachi band, a soldier fiddled with the butt of his automatic machine gun. His polished black boots were impossible to miss among the hundreds of pairs of flip-flops. Sweat streamed over the khaki chinstrap of his camouflage helmet. His heavy bulletproof vest doubled the size of his barely adult torso. It was 34 degrees centigrade and there was scarcely a free patch of sand between the beach towels and parasols, but he was dressed for all-out war.
Despite playing host to Hollywood’s great and good between Jav Tube the 1950s and 1980s, Acapulco’s crescent bay has fallen on troubled times. Frank Sinatra famously described the city as “perfect for a flying honeymoon,” in his 1958 hit Come Fly with Me, but in each of the past five years the homicide rate has been higher here than anywhere else in Mexico, giving rise to a notorious modern title: Mexico’s murder capital.
According to the latest US State Department travel advisories, you’re in as much danger here than in Syria and Afghanistan. In a peculiar contrast though, Acapulco and the state of Guerrero (if you believe the state government) have been seeing a steady rise in tourists. Last weekend, hotels in Zona Dorada, the area overlooking Acapulco Bay, were (again, if you Jav Streaming take the official figures as gospel) at 86 per cent occupancy and last year Guerrero saw a 40 per cent increase in tourists compared to 2016, despite 2,316 murders. So what gives?
Thousands still flock here every week for sun and fun
Thousands still flock here every week for sun and fun CREDIT: GETTY
“Tourists are certainly coming back, but it will never be the way it was,” said 70-year-old taxi driver Miguel, reminiscing about Acapulco’s “glory days” in the 70s, as we drove past tennis court-sized billboards advertising long-term condominium lets and busy bars blaring out metronomic regaton. “You shouldn’t feel unsafe here,” he insisted. “People believe everything they read in the newspapers, but for ‘normal’ people it’s not as crazy as that.”
Despite playing host to Hollywood’s great and good between Jav Tube the 1950s and 1980s, Acapulco’s crescent bay has fallen on troubled times. Frank Sinatra famously described the city as “perfect for a flying honeymoon,” in his 1958 hit Come Fly with Me, but in each of the past five years the homicide rate has been higher here than anywhere else in Mexico, giving rise to a notorious modern title: Mexico’s murder capital.
According to the latest US State Department travel advisories, you’re in as much danger here than in Syria and Afghanistan. In a peculiar contrast though, Acapulco and the state of Guerrero (if you believe the state government) have been seeing a steady rise in tourists. Last weekend, hotels in Zona Dorada, the area overlooking Acapulco Bay, were (again, if you Jav Streaming take the official figures as gospel) at 86 per cent occupancy and last year Guerrero saw a 40 per cent increase in tourists compared to 2016, despite 2,316 murders. So what gives?
Thousands still flock here every week for sun and fun
Thousands still flock here every week for sun and fun CREDIT: GETTY
“Tourists are certainly coming back, but it will never be the way it was,” said 70-year-old taxi driver Miguel, reminiscing about Acapulco’s “glory days” in the 70s, as we drove past tennis court-sized billboards advertising long-term condominium lets and busy bars blaring out metronomic regaton. “You shouldn’t feel unsafe here,” he insisted. “People believe everything they read in the newspapers, but for ‘normal’ people it’s not as crazy as that.”
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