ABSTRACT
My first visit to Cancún was in the spring of 1997. I had been traveling slowly along Mexico's Caribbean coast, from Chetumal, a large market town near the Belizean border, through the seaside villages of Tulum and Xpu-Ha, which at the time were international backpacker destinations noted for their uncrowded beaches, inexpensive campgrounds (or just places to pitch a tent), cabañas, and guesthouses. The coastline of Quintana Roo was still largely devoid of the massive tourism developments that have come to characterize it in more recent years, at least as far south as Tulum. What Mexican tourism of cials call the Cancún mega-proyecto(megaproject) had yet to burst its bubble and produce wave after wave of tourism development along the Yucatán littoral. Even in 1997, however, signs of the coastal tourist boom were imminent, and nothing portended an ever larger influx of northern visitors more than a new four-lane highway under construction from Cancún to points further south. After passing through Xcaret, I stopped just south of Cancún in the older resort of Playa del Carmen and pitched my tent in a small campground near the center of town.
