‘Is it safe to go to Mexico?’ We hear that question weekly. And the answer is always yes, if you know where to go and do your research.

Despite increased reports of grisly drug-war murders that tend to cluster in northern border zones, travel to Mexico did edge back up a bit in 2010. Still many more potential visitors are passing on Mexico – or even staying aboard the cruise ship when it docks at places like the essentially crime-free Cozumel.

Before brushing a Mexico trip aside this year, consider that about 245,000 square miles are free from the State Department’s warning list and it neatly matches areas people usually visit (Cabo, Cancún, Cozumel, Tulum, Mexico City, Oaxaca, San Miguel de Allende).

Recently, the San Francisco Chronicle listed the five safest Mexican states to visit, in terms of per-capita drug-related homicides (per Mexican government statistics). We’d like to add to the list by zeroing in on our eight top places to visit (there are dozens of other candidates), in terms of travel appeal and safety record. None are on the US State Department’s warning list.

1. Mexico City

There really is no more fascinating city in the world than Mexico’s misunderstood capital. With a population of over 21 million (and a crime rate about a third of Washington, DC’s), Mexico City had a serious scrub-up for its bi-centennial, and now some places like mariachi-filled Plaza Garibaldi are considered (like Times Square in New York) safe enough to be a ‘Disney version’ of its former gritty self. Also, many restored colonial buildings show details long obscured by years of pollution build-up. Meanwhile, this ancient city built over a filled-in lake has Aztec canals, pyramids, Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo’s old studio, and hipster dining in chic eateries of the Condesa and Polanco. That and a million other things.

Soak up the 21st-century style at the great B&B Red Tree House, built in an ultra-stylish 1930s home in Condesa. Rooms start at $79.

2. Mérida

Four hours inland from Cancún, Mérida is ‘real Mexico,’ a colonial city of 750,000 lived-in and loved by locals and near several days’ worth of superb daytrips. It’s not only an underrated add-on from a beach vacation, but a destination in its own right. The city’s best on weekends, when the historical core – a scene of 17th-century cathedrals made from Mayan bricks – closes to vehicles and fills with open-air stages, taco stands and much life. By day, the Ruta Puuc is an easy DIY bus loop of Uxmal and four other interesting Mayan sites. To the northwest, you can tour flamingo-filled mangroves at the fishing village of Celestún.

Los Arcos is a fun B&B, with courtyard pool and art-filled rooms, made from a 19th-century home.

3. Todos Santos

If you’ve not been – and most haven’t – circle ‘Todos Santos’ for the next Baja trip. Sure, some long-timers say it’s not what it used to be, as popularity has swelled (and its ‘gringo: Mexicano’ ratio has evened out), but it still beats the Cabo San Lucas condos for laid-back sense of peace in Baja Sur (incidentally one of Mexico’s safest states). A couple hours from the Cabo or La Paz airports, it’s a mountain-backed artist community near very good surfing beaches. You can easily drive into Sammy Hagar bars and boat trips at Cabo, then return for the quiet at night. Plus the Hotel California here likes to claim it’s the Hotel Califoria (it isn’t, but don’t tell them we said so).

Learn to surf at Pescadero Surf Camp, complete with lessons and (yay!) a BYO swim-up bar. If it’s just comfort you want, Posada La Posa is one of Baja’s most atmospheric inns.

4. San Miguel de Allende

Yes, it’s obvious, and with reason. A bit of an American-expat go-to of the silver towns of the central highlands north of Mexico City (and two hours from the León airport), San Miguel de Allende is a stunner, with any worry of drug violence a distant rumor. The town itself – as seen in Robert Rodriguez’s Once Upon a Time in Mexico – is the main attraction. A Unesco World Heritage site since 2008, the town of 62,000 is filled with handicraft shops, 17th-century cathedrals, botanic gardens, organic farmer restaurants and lovely (sometimes luxe) guesthouses.

San Miguel’s a good spot to study Spanish or cooking. Set in a colonial building, Academia Hispano Americano is a good choice (and can arrange homestays).

5. Huatulco

If it’s resorts you want, Huatulco is a rare success story in recent resort development. This former fishing village has become the Oaxacan beach resort of choice lately, benefiting from its gentle development plan that keeps much of the 12 miles of sandy shoreline completely unspoiled and the town under six-stories high. Activities can fill several days. Snorkeling, diving, kayaking, surfing, cycling and rafting trips are easy to find, as are tours to waterfalls and coffee farms. There are flights in from Mexico City and Oaxaca City.

The Mediterranean, hacienda-styled Camino Real Zaashila is, by our authors’ estimation, one of the greatest stays on the Pacific Coast. Most of the rooms in the gorgeously landscaped property have private pools.

6. Playa del Carmen

Speaking of forward-thinking resort towns, Playa del Carmen corrects nearly every mistake of Cancún’s Zona Hotelera just up the road of the Yucatán Peninsula. With direct buses to the Cancún airport, the ped-oriented Fifth Ave (‘La Quinta’ – where it’s wise to keep an eye out on your belongings after hours) is lined with bars, nightclubs, take-away tacos and tacky souvenirs. And it’s one block from the water. Yes, it’s touristy (particularly when the cruise ships are in), but you can keep walking north to more remote beaches where the crystal-clear water is home to some of the world’s better snorkeling (even better if you daytrip by boat to nearby Cozumel Island). Also consider renting a car and go cenote-hopping for a surreal dip in rain-filled limestone sinkholes.

A nice mid-range choice, a couple blocks from the main strip, Kinbé Hotel is an Italian-owned hotel with a breezy rooftop terrace and a lush courtyard.

7. Guanajuato

A gorgeous hill town of 16th-century cathedrals and brightly colored homes on alleys ways and plazas lined with laurel trees, Guanajuato is best visited during October’s Festival Cervantino – a serious cultural extravaganza with orchestras, ballet folklórico, modern art, mariachis, Moroccan folk, Mexico City punk bands. And most of it’s free. At any time of year it’s a great hub for laid-back colonial life and a look at a mummy museum, plus a visit could easily be combined with nearby San Miguel de Allende. The town’s 30 minutes from León’s Bajío airport

8. Puebla

A ‘mini Mexico City’ – with a mere 1.5 million residents – Puebla is a colonial wonder city, packed with cathedrals and a wonderful museum devoted to ancient artifacts, and is far more manageable and laid-back than the size attests. The historic center is the place to stay, with building decked in azuelos (painted tiles) and many spots to sample the local taco árabe (Arabic taco), made of marinated pork served on Middle Eastern-style flat bread. (Try Las Ranas at Av 2 Pte 102). More adventurous should ask for escamoles (rice-like ant larvae sauteed in butter). It’s two hours by bus from Mexico City.

I would like to add Ajijic, Lake Chapala, Jalisco to this list of safe places based on personal experience of living here for 17 years and raising our children here. For more information on our wonderful, safe, expat community nestled between the Sierra Madre Mountains and Lake Chapala just 40 minutes outside of the second largest city in Mexico, Guadalajara, just google us or check out my previous blogs where I try to give newcomers a sense of what we have to offer which for us is paradise.

First: A reality check on Mexico

Mexico is in a unique position to reap many of the benefits of the decline of the US economy. In order to not violate NAFTA and other agreements the U.S.A. cannot use direct protectionism, so it is content to allow the media to play this protectionist role. The U.S. media – over the last year – has portrayed Mexico as being on the brink of economic collapse and civil war. The Mexican people are either beheaded, kidnapped, poor, corrupt, or narco-traffickers. The American news media was particularly aggressive in the weeks leading up to spring break. The main reason for this is money. During that two-week period, over 120,000 young American citizens poured into Mexico and left behind hundreds of millions of dollars.

Let’s look at the reality of the massive drug and corruption problem, kidnappings, murders and money. The U.S. Secretary of State Clinton was clear in her honest assessment of the problem. “Our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade. Our inability to prevent the weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border to arm these criminals causes the deaths of police officers, soldiers and civilians,” Clinton said. The other large illegal business that is smuggled into the U.S.A. that no one likes to talk about is Human Traffic for prostitution. This “business” is globally now competing with drugs in terms of profits.

It is critical to understand, however that the horrific violence in Mexico is over 95% confined to the three transshipping cities for these two businesses, Juarez, Tijuana and Nogales. The Mexican government is so serious about fighting this, that they have committed over 30,000 soldiers to these borders towns. There was a thoughtful article written by a professor at the University of Juarez. He was reminded of the Prohibition years in the U.S.A. and compared Juarez to Chicago when Al Capone was conducting his reign of terror capped off with The Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre. During these years, just like Juarez today, 99% of the citizens went about their daily lives and attended classes, went to the movies, restaurants, and parks.
(more…)

This has indeed been a very emotional week-end for a myriad of reasons.

On Friday was the beautiful and inspiring Royal Wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton now the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. This was a wonderful event watched around the world which brought hope to many for a better tomorrow.

Saturday a dear and treasured friend left to return to Canada after a splendid and eventful 5 month visit and she will be sorely missed.

Sunday there was an unheard of and rare occurrence when at 9:00 pm in the evening President Barack Obama called a news conference in the East Wing of the White House and the speculation ran rampant as the announcement was delayed over an hour.

When he finally did enter the briefing room it was to announce to the world that Osama Bin Laden had been killed in a covert Navy Seal operation in Abbottabad 80 miles north of the capital of Pakistan, Islamabad. No US troops were harmed and care was taken to protect civilians. The entire operation took about 40 minutes. President Obama also credited the Pakistani President, Asif Ali Zardari, with assisting the US in locating Osama Bin Laden and, indeed, carrying out the mission which took Bin Laden out of a mansion and not in the tribal mountainous areas as previously suspected.

We now have DNA proof that it was Osama Bin Laden that had been killed and President Obama said that “Justice has been done”.
(more…)

We keep hearing the same things about people’s upcoming move to Mexico.

“Why are you moving to Mexico? It is very dangerous there!” We constantly hear uninformed rhetoric gleaned from cable news and talk radio about the murder rate, the kidnapping rate and the “disappearance” rate, etcetera, etcetera. We hear about the dangers of SCUBA diving, shark attacks and even heat exhaustion. American’s need to wake up to the realization that FEAR is an industry in the United States and we are rabid consumers of it. We are not saying you shouldn’t be cautious but some perspective needs to be applied.

In 2002 tens of thousands of people in the United States swore off airplanes and began driving cars on vacation because they were afraid of being killed by terrorists. This despite the fact that in a typical year there are more than 40,000 people killed in vehicular accidents in the US. In other words, assuming the trend continued (which it didn’t) the odds of being killed by a terrorist in 2002 would have been one in 9 million. In that same year the odds of dying in a traffic accident were about one in 7,000.
(more…)

Reprinted from The Catalist empowering the Mexican – American Relationship (August 11th, 2010)

In recent months the debate about violence in Mexico has heated up significantly. Most news channels have been giving a broad coverage on the facts of crime, which are usually focused on the issue of combating organized crime.

When it comes to human lifes, it is always difficult to speak coldly about figures. But when we need to know what really is going on, in terms of crime, we can do nothing but refer to them.

The indicator which measures the violence in a country is the number of violent deaths per 100,000 people. This indicator has the advantage of allowing us to compare figures between countries with different population sizes.
(more…)

These are two accounts of people safely traveling to and crossing into Mexico at Ciudad Juarez and Laredo.

Day 1

The first couple left from Durango, Colorado about 10:00 am on a Tuesday with a full car and roof carrier bursting at the seams.

They had dinner that night at Las Cruces in New Mexico and then arrived on the west side of El Paso at 7:30 pm. They stayed at La Quinta at Exit 11 because they had two pets with them.

(more…)

In the book “Live Better South of the Border –Mexico” Mexico Mike writes about the pluses and minuses, positives and negatives of living in Mexico. He tries to honestly tell you the good and bad points about living in Mexico.

Frankly, Mexico is the not the cheapest country in the world to live. Yes, it costs less to live in Mexico with a better standard of living than many parts of the US or Canada, but if money is your only motivator, there are other countries that cost less.

You can live for less in Arkansas or South Texas than in Mexico’s gringo areas.

Mexico is not paradise but it is a perfect place to live for many people, but it is not prefect. While there are many reasons to live in Mexico, there are also many reasons why living in Mexico many not be for you.

Negativity isn’t the point. Reality is.

Safety of living in Mexico is most people’s irst concern. Ask any gringo living in Mexico of he/she feels safe living in Mexico. The answer will be yes. There are sensational news stories about Mexicans getting killled in gunfights etc. Most of these people are involved in drugs or something illegal.

(more…)

This is information from the U.S. Department of State and other experts.

Most of the tourist and resort areas are separated by hundreds of miles from the volatile battlegrounds of the drug war. Tourism officials say staying away from Mexico City, Puerto Vallarta and other areas of Mexico because of what is going on it Ciudad Juarez would be like not traveling to Nebraska because of something happening in New York City. (Wall Street Journal)

According to the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. and Mexico border areas are most affected by the drug wars and if there is some sort of drug violence or serious crime, it generally doesn’t take place in tourist areas. (Fodor’s)

(more…)

U.S. – Mexico Crime Rate Comparison

You would think right off the bat that surely crime in the United States is far lower on average than it would be in Mexico. At least that’s what more Americans would be inclined to initially believe. As it turns out it depends on what category of crime you are looking at

The numbers fluctuate from year to year but on average they remain within a certain ballpark. If you were to look at total crimes committed in the United States per l00,000 inhabitants the number would be about 4000 per year.

(more…)

Crime in the USA vs. Mexico

Over the next few blogs I would like to share some information I have uncovered to refute the “dire” warnings issued in travel advisories about Mexico.

Just about every country in the world is now experiencing increased crime rates. However, there are usually safe areas in every country where the crime rate is lower or non-existent. Ajijic, Lake Chapala is one of those safe areas.

The US State Department put out a warning about the violence in Mexico. Although the report states that 128 Americans were killed in Mexico between Jan 2006 and December 2008 one has only to look more closely at the data for the northwestern part of Mexico including Rosarito Beach, Ensenada, Mexicali, San Felipe, Tecate and Puerto Penasco to see that 42 Americans were killed, from all causes (there were at least 4 suicides) in the last three years combined.
(more…)