By the Caribbean Journal staff

Sandals Resorts International has officially broken ground on its newest resort project in the Caribbean.

Saint Lucia Prime Minister Allen Chastanet turned the sod on the Sandals LaSource Saint Lucia project, which will be the company’s fifth fourth on the island.

Chastanet was joined by a delegation including Minister with Responsibility for Tourism Dominic Fedee, Minister of Economic Development and Urban Renewal Guy Joseph, Sandals Director of Corporate Services Jeremy Jones and Sandals Saint Lucia Managing Director Winston Anderson.

Chastanet said the project would bring “significant” benefits to the island. citing a close to $65 million in additional expenditures expected to be generated by the property.

The 330-suite resort gets its name from its sister property in Grenada.

It will include features from over-the-water bungalows to swim-up suites, with a setting on Pigeon Island Beach, adjacent to the company’s Sandals Grande resort.

The post Sandals Breaks Ground on New Saint Lucia Hotel Project appeared first on Caribbean Journal.

Powered by WPeMatico

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Cancun International Airport has continued to post positive growth, according to the latest numbers from Grupo Aeroportuario del Sureste, or ASUR, which manages the airport.

Cancun’s airport reported 2.21 million passengers in April, a 3.8 percent increase compared to the same month in 2017.

For the year, Cancun Airport traffic is up 8.1 percent to just under 8.76 million passengers in the first four months of this year.

Heading to Cancun? Check out our list of the top places to stay in Cancun right now.

— CJ

The post Cancun Airport Continues to Post Positive Growth appeared first on Caribbean Journal.

Powered by WPeMatico

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Fresh off the news of rival American Airlines’ huge Caribbean expansion, JetBlue has added another new nonstop route to the region.

JetBlue has officially launched its newest daily nonstop flights, connecting Newark, New Jersey and Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic.

The move strengthens JetBlue’s position as the leading carrier to the Dominican Republic —indeed, the carrier operates more daily flights to the country than any other airline.

Santo Domingo.

It’s also another boost for what has become an important new destination for the Dominican Republic as it looks to expand tourism hubs beyond Punta Cana, part of a wider push to reach 10 million annual tourists by the year 2023.

El Embajador.

Santo Domingo has become a hot urban destination, with existing hotels like the JW Marriott and the recently transformed El Embajador, and a fascinating Colonial Zone that has become a full-fledged destination in its own right.

The Colonial Zone.

JetBlue now operates four routes to the Caribbean out of Newark, including to Santiago, San Juan and Barbados.

JetBlue serves Dominican airports including La Romana, Puerto Plata, Punta Cana, Santiago and Santo Domingo.

The carrier is operating the new Santo Domingo flights on Airbus A320 aircraft with 150 seats.

The post JetBlue Launches New Daily Flights to Santo Domingo appeared first on Caribbean Journal.

Powered by WPeMatico

By Alexander Britell

It’s the late evening and Saint Lucia is awake.

This is the sound of the island at night, the shake of trees and the call of birds and the calming hum of the natural world.

It’s not often you get the chance to stay in the heart of a rainforest, in the core of a cacao plantation, your cottage hugged by fruit trees.

But Saint Lucia’s Fond Doux plantation is no ordinary place to stay.

This is a full-fledged eco-hotel, a tiny colonial-style boutique property set on a working 250-year-old plantation.

This is Saint Lucia as it once was, as it still is, hand crafted and home made.

There are 15 cottages tucked across the 134-acre plantation, ranging from one-bedroom secluded retreats to a two-bedroom standalone cottage to our favorite, the one-bedroom cottages with its own private plunge pool.

Yes, it’s a working cacao plantation.

The food is local and authentic at the on-site Bamboo and Cocoa Pod restaurants, true Creole cooking with real ingredients. There’s a spa, too, the Mama La Terre, with unique treatments like flight relief massages and even hot spring journeys.

It is a place for finding oneness with the natural world, for hiking, for breathing the kind of air you can’t find anywhere else, for enjoying the colors of Saint Lucia’s wild side.

But you can’t stay here without immersing yourself in the culture of cacao, eating, drinking (in cocoa tea) and even making it, experiencing every step of the process from cocoa harvesting to drying to grinding to the finished product.

Its all thanks to the painstaking work of Saint Lucian hoteliers Eroline and Lyton Lamontagne, who have turned this family-run resort into one of the Caribbean’s most unique destinations.

For more information, visit Fond Doux.

The post Saint Lucia’s Fond Doux Plantation, a Unique Caribbean Eco-Hotel appeared first on Caribbean Journal.

Powered by WPeMatico

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Hyatt’s Hyatt Centric Brand is expanding again in the region with its second property in Central America.

The brand is slated to open a 138-room Hyatt Centric in San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador, a debut that comes on the heels of the debut a new Hyatt Centric in Guatemala.

The Hyatt Centric San Salvador, set in the Soho Cascadas mixed-use project, is scheduled to open in the fourth quarter of this year.

It will be managed by GHL Hotels, which manages a number of properties in the region.

The brand has been rapidly expanding its footprint in the wider Caribbean Basin, with plans for a new Hyatt Centric in Barbados also in the pipeline.

The latter is set to open in Barbados next year.

“The hospitality Hyatt Centric San Salvador will offer travelers will surprise the market,” said Fernando Paiz, president, LATAM Hotel Corporation. “Continuing our relationship with the Hyatt Centric brand, we’re confident we can demonstrate our expertise to guests, helping them tap into the city’s cosmopolitan hot spots or unique destinations known only to locals.”

The project is the brainchild of LATAM Hotel Corporation, which also owns Hyatt-branded properties in Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua.

It is planning to open a new Hyatt Place in San Pedro Sula, Honduras in the third quarter of 2018.

The post Hyatt Centric Expanding in Central America appeared first on Caribbean Journal.

Powered by WPeMatico