But Centro’s tough barrios are finally attracting some attention as well. Call it gritty tourism – there are guided trips to cantinas and markets famous for prostitution and drug dens. Nighttime groups stroll areas that many Mexicans, fearing muggings, still wouldn’t enter past sundown.

There’s even a guided visit of the area’s pornographic theaters.

“It’s a tour above all historic, but also anthropological,” said David García, whose company runs the tour, “the people that go to these places, they have a series of rituals inside.”

García, whose company is called Rec (Recorridos Culturales), gives tours through La Merced, a neighborhood where prostitutes line the sidewalk in broad daylight. The area is also famous for commercial corridors like “Beauty Street,” filled with stands offering manicures and fake highlights.

While García’s routes can titillate, he’s mostly interested in the Centro’s history and gives less scandalous tours as well.

Named a UNESCO World Heritage Center in 1987, the Centro sits on Tenochtitlán, the old Aztec capital.  It’s where Hernán Cortés toppled the ruler Cuauhtémoc, creating the basis for modern Mexico.

For years, Centro was in decline, due in part to a huge 1985 earthquake. But it recently began repopulating. The city has also pedestrianized various streets, creating new shopping and nightlife zones. Meanwhile, a foundation backed by Mexican Billionaire Carlos Slim has fixed-up building facades.

And many Mexicans, as well as foreigners, are taking advantage.

“There’s an intense reunion of the people of Mexico City and the country with the Centro Histórico,” said Inti Muñoz, director of the Mexico City Centro Histórico Trust.

Last year, Muñoz’s organization released “The New Guide of Mexico’s Centro Histórico,” which intermingles images of hipster bars, mariachis, remodeled plazas and neighborhood characters, like the female luchadora “Heart of Fire.”

“We are overjoyed that Mexico has broken our longstanding record with regard to international visitation,” said Rodolfo Lopez-Negrete, Chief Operating Officer of the Mexico Tourism Board, “these figures clearly demonstrate that the bold diversification strategy we have implemented, promoting a broad tourism offering and targeting an expanded breed of global consumer, is succeeding.”

Following efforts to attract a more diverse cohort of tourists from a range of international markets, Mexico saw in a significant increase in visitor numbers compared to 2010 from Brazil (66 percent), Russia (55 percent), China (30 percent), Colombia (23.2 percent), Italy (13 percent), Australia (13 percent) United Kingdom (11.6 percent), France (10 percent), Japan (9.3 percent) and Canada (7 percent).Mexico remains the most popular international destination for U.S. tourists. The economic environment in the U.S. translated to fewer Americans traveling abroad in 2011; according to the Department of Commerce international air travel from the U.S. declined 4.1 percent in 2011. Mexico, however increased its market share in the US from 14.1 to 15 percent.

A key focus for the Mexico Tourism Board in 2012 will also be to capitalize on, celebrate and promote the start of the new Mayan calendar, promoting travel to the five state which comprise the Mayan World – specifically Quintana Roo, Campeche, Tabasco, Chiapas and the Yucatan.

“Building off an exceptionally strong 2011 we are confident that 2012 will be another record breaking year, particularly in light of the upcoming campaign to promote Mundo Maya.”

“What they want is for us to sell,” Gonzalez said. “That’s what they have asked of us. There is someone who wants to buy and who is part of the downtown (redevelopment) program. But we’re not going to sell the hotel. That is decided.”

Gonzalez also said the company is not interested in actively participating in El Paso’s downtown renewal.

“We’re not going to be part of this program,” she said. “Our hotel is going to continue to be maintained as a historic building according to our rules, which are Mexican rules for a Mexican company.”

El Paso’s Camino Real is one of 28 hotels of the flagship hotel brand belonging to Grupo Empresarial Angeles, a more than 40-year-old outfit that describes itself as “100 percent Mexican.”

Grupo Empresarial Angeles has owned the Camino Real since 2000, when it purchased the chain from a group of investors.

All but the El Paso hotel – which celebrates its 100th anniversary this year – are scattered across Mexico, from Juárez to Veracruz, from Tijuana to Tuxtla Gutierrez. All are branded for a high-end market.

Which is one reason why the bare-minimum bathrooms, the 1980s-era furniture and older televisions in most of the rooms in the El Paso property don’t seem to square with the hotel’s image.

Gonzalez acknowledged that the hotel’s general manager, René Rubio, has been asking the leadership in Mexico City for additional investment.

“And he’s right,” she said.

Investment priorities

Grupo Empresarial Angeles has spent $3 million over the past four years on renovations, including replacing carpets and reupholstering furniture, Gonzalez said.

Another $1 million in investment is currently programmed, she said, up from the previously reported estimate of $800,000.

The company is private and does not publicly report earnings, revenue or capital expenditures.

“What we don’t have are dates,” she said, adding that it was “probable” that the company would upgrade the bathrooms and replace the TVs with newer models this year.

In El Paso, city officials have said that a major, full-service hotel like the Camino is critical to its Downtown revitalization plans, as well as to attract convention business.

Last August, the El Paso Convention and Visitors Bureau told the Camino’s owners it would no longer recommend the hotel to visitors.

“There are 357 rentable rooms, but because of the deterioration of the property, we have lost our convention headquarters hotel,” Bill Blaziek, the CVB’s CEO, told El Paso Inc.

That was after the hotel’s air conditioning broke down in the heat of the summer. Special guests booked into the hotel for the Plaza Classic Film Festival were moved out of sweltering rooms and into the DoubleTree by the festival’s organizer, the El Paso Community Foundation.

About the same time, the hotel’s telephone system went down, so no one could call in and guests could not call out. That problem was fixed with a new phone system.

Blaziek sent a sharply worded e-mail to the Camino’s owners.

“In fairness to the El Paso community, it’s long overdue for your company to make dramatic improvements to your property and a change in your operations here,” Blaziek wrote in an Aug. 30 e-mail.

And in December, LULAC, the National League of United Latin American Citizens, decided to move its 2013 national convention out of El Paso because of problems with the Camino Real. But some local LULAC leaders say that decision isn’t final, and they are hoping the convention will go on as scheduled.

A total of 1.07 million international travelers visited Mexico last month, with U.S. visitors up 10.6% over the same month a year ago.

Year-end figures for 2011 are not yet tallied.

“We envisage that 2012 will be a record-breaking year for Mexico in terms of tourism numbers,” said Rodolfo Lopez-Negrete, COO of the Mexico Tourism Board.

“The board will continue to market directly to non-traditional markets in Europe and Asia as well as the U.S. and Canada,” he said.

A key focus this year will be an awareness campaign targeting travel to the five states that comprise the ancient world of the Maya: Quintana Roo, Campeche, Tabasco, Chiapas and Yucatan.

More than 1.07 million international travelers visited Mexico in the last month of 2011, a record for December. To know about Travel……click here

In addition to an increase of visitors from the US (10.6 percent) and Canada (9.1 percent), Mexico received significant year on year increases from Spain (6 percent), Italy (10.5 percent), Argentina (21.4 percent), and France (12.4 percent).

“We envisage that 2012 will be a record-breaking year for Mexico in terms of tourism numbers,” said Rodolfo Lopez-Negrete, Chief Operating Officer of the Mexico Tourism Board. “Mexico’s tourism industry is undergoing a stunning transformation – based on a bold strategy of diversification — focused on promoting a broader range of tourism products (i.e. cultural tourism, adventure travel and health related-tourism) aimed at attracting a new breed of global consumer.”

“The Mexico Tourism Board will continue to market directly to tourists from non-traditional origins in Europe and Asia, while at the same time strengthening our hold on American and Canadian travelers.”

A key focus for the Mexico Tourism Board in 2012 will also be to capitalize on, celebrate and promote the start of the new Mayan calendar — with a strong awareness campaign aimed at promoting travel to the five states that comprise the Mayan World – specifically Quintana Roo, Campeche, Tabasco, Chiapas and the Yucatan.

This further reinforces the Mexican Government’s goals of aggressively driving a diversified tourism strategy to achieve its goal of ranking amongst the world’s top five tourism destinations by 2015.

“We have no intention of simply being seen as a ‘sun and beach destination.’ Mundo Maya is a prime example of this strategy as we are converting the Southeast into a coveted tourist destination, internationally.”

Details of what happened remain unclear but family members say they’re horrified the Calgary medical centre worker was apparently viciously attacked.

Her uncle, Robert Prosser, from his Kingston, N.S. home, said, “She was brutally attacked. They found her in the elevator, laying there beaten quite bad. She was unconscious.”

It could be a month before she is fit to return to Calgary for further treatment, said Prosser.

WestJet, Canada’s No. 2 airline, said it expected to hold talks with employees through January on the plan to set up the carrier, which would operate with 40 turboprop planes.

Until now, WestJet, which was launched in 1996 as a low-cost airline modelled on U.S.-based Southwest Airlines, has operated a single fleet of Boeing 737 aircraft on routes within Canada and to mainly sun destinations in the United States, Mexico and the Caribbean.

But the Calgary-based airline, which has increasingly moved away from its low-cost roots as it searches for new revenue sources, has mulled adding a second fleet for some time.

It said in several media interviews over the Christmas period that if it expanded it was likely to be into a fleet of smaller aircraft to serve smaller communities in Canada.

The move would increase competition with Air Canada, the country’s largest carrier, which uses regional airline Chorus Aviation to fly to smaller domestic markets.

“Right now, in a lot of places, Air Canada is maybe the only game in town,” said PI Financial analyst Chris Murray.

A WestJet spokeswoman said staff would be asked to vote on the proposal, which would create new connections with existing WestJet destinations and boost the frequency of its flights. The process should be completed in early February, she said.

WestJet chairman and founder, Clive Beddoe, said in a statement that a sister company would operate the turboprops.

WestJet did not say which aircraft it was but market speculation is that the Q400 turboprop, made by fellow Canadian company Bombardier Inc, was the most likely candidate.

Murray noted that the new airline’s likely competitors, Chorus and Skyservice Business Aviation, also flew Q400s, as does Porter Airlines, a regional airline focused on Eastern Canada.

Shares in WestJet were 11 Canadian cents weaker at C$11.69 on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Monday morning. Air Canada’s stock was unchanged at C$1.06 and Chorus Aviation’s shares were 3 Canadian cents firmer at C$3.39.

Mexicana, which had been one of Mexico’s two leading airlines, stopped operating on Aug. 28, 2010, along with sister budget carriers Click and Link.

The Mexicana group of airlines filed for bankruptcy protection after racking up an estimated 12 billion pesos ($863 million) in debt.

Quintana Frias, a 35-year Mexicana veteran, started his hunger strike in the first minute of Jan. 1 and vowed not to end it until “officials satisfy our demands.”

“I will continue my hunger strike until officials pay attention to my request and we have a resolution of the conflict,” the pilot told Efe.

Quintana Frias is camping out at the Mexicana de Aviacion counters in Terminal 1 of the Mexico City international airport.

A group of pilots and other employees held a rally in the terminal and handed out fliers that looked like tickets to travelers, urging them to support the effort to revive Mexicana.

Workers plan to take other “drastic measures” so the federal government will pay attention to their plight, flight attendants union secretary-general Ricardo Del Valle told reporters.

“We have asked them for a meeting for a year and they have not even taken one call from us,” Del Valle said.

The Mayan civilization reached its peak between 250 and 900AD and was fascinated by mathematics, astronomy, and the cycles of time.

Its Long Count calendar began in 3114BC and moves forward in 394-year periods known as Baktuns. The winter solstice in 2012 marks the completion of the 13^th Baktun, a date of particular significance that reflects celestial alignments recognized by modern astronomers.

The notion that the world will end is largely an idea spread by thousands of doomsday bloggers – a concept that gained further traction after the release of the Hollywood blockbuster film “2012.” Archaeologists and Maya experts say the prophecy foretells a powerful god’s return to earth and the beginning of a new era.

Many experts similarly predict the metaphorical end of an era, not the end of the world.

Nonetheless, tourism officials hope to capitalize on the international buzz.

“The Maya cosmology has sparked the interest of tourists and students of the matter worldwide, something that will be an important element of tourist promotion,” the tourism office said Wednesday.

Several cities began promotional schemes this week. The city of Tapachula on the Guatemalan border unveiled an eight-foot digital clock in its main park to begin the countdown exactly a year before the date. In the nearby archaeological site of Izapa, Maya priests burned incense, chanted and offered prayers.

On the Caribbean coast between Cancun and Playa del Carmen, residents and tourists alike placed messages and photos in a time capsule to be buried for 50 years.

The National Institute of Anthropology and History will open three additional ruins to tourists this year, though they say Mayan thinking has been misinterpreted and the year simply marks the end of a cycle.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon announced recently that there would be nearly 500 Maya-themed events throughout the year in southern Mexico, including workshops, music, and dance festivals.

In an average year, the whole of Mexico gets only 22 million tourists. Visitor numbers in 2012 are expected to be astronomical.

The Mayan civilization reached its peak between 250 and 900AD and was fascinated by mathematics, astronomy, and the cycles of time.

Its Long Count calendar began in 3114BC and moves forward in 394-year periods known as Baktuns. The winter solstice in 2012 marks the completion of the 13^th Baktun, a date of particular significance that reflects celestial alignments recognized by modern astronomers.

The notion that the world will end is largely an idea spread by thousands of doomsday bloggers – a concept that gained further traction after the release of the Hollywood blockbuster film “2012.” Archaeologists and Maya experts say the prophecy foretells a powerful god’s return to earth and the beginning of a new era.

Many experts similarly predict the metaphorical end of an era, not the end of the world.

Nonetheless, tourism officials hope to capitalize on the international buzz.

“The Maya cosmology has sparked the interest of tourists and students of the matter worldwide, something that will be an important element of tourist promotion,” the tourism office said Wednesday.

Several cities began promotional schemes this week. The city of Tapachula on the Guatemalan border unveiled an eight-foot digital clock in its main park to begin the countdown exactly a year before the date. In the nearby archaeological site of Izapa, Maya priests burned incense, chanted and offered prayers.

On the Caribbean coast between Cancun and Playa del Carmen, residents and tourists alike placed messages and photos in a time capsule to be buried for 50 years.

The National Institute of Anthropology and History will open three additional ruins to tourists this year, though they say Mayan thinking has been misinterpreted and the year simply marks the end of a cycle.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon announced recently that there would be nearly 500 Maya-themed events throughout the year in southern Mexico, including workshops, music, and dance festivals.

In an average year, the whole of Mexico gets only 22 million tourists. Visitor numbers in 2012 are expected to be astronomical.