Veracruz won’t be a destination for international cruises for the rest of 2014: Luis Peña

Even though it is still an aspiration for the lender services of the region, Veracruz won’t be contemplated as a destiny for the permanent arrivals of international cruises, said Luis Peña, president of Veracruz’s Conventions.

“The goal is to go to Miami’s International Cruises Fair in March 2015, to see if we can set this possibility with the arrival of touristic boats from the United States next year. We need to keep promoting Veracruz constantly, it is not easy, but the key is to know how to sell the destiny.”

From his point of view, there is a huge potential, infrastructure, location, and supply to let the arrival of this type of boats that will leave a huge revenue in the zone, but several factors are stopping this possibility.



“If we want to bring cruises regularly, we need a makeover, and the population doesn’t know that. We need the United State to really get to know where we are, and little by little open new doors.”

He added that Veracruz hasn’t stopped being an ideal site for the arrival cruises, but “we need to see the situation of the city with critic eyes, not friendly, unfortunately there is a lot of garbage on the streets, you can see the contrast from a place like Tlacotalpan where everything is clean, there is a difference.”



“We need cleanliness in the city, appropriate information, the restaurants’ personnel should speak English fluently. We have as well archeological zones really close, that is favorable, but we also have violent events that could affect our image.”

He said that during his promotion, Veracruz has a record of 52 touristic cruises that have stayed in Veracruz.



During the interview, Peña admitted that some cruises did arrived to rest against bad weather, but a few years ago Veracruz was considered by some companies as a good destiny.

“We are hoping that next year things will change and we will receive cruises from the United States constantly,” he concluded.