Butterfly garden
posted by Tian at 11:35 AM
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Costa Rica Travel
Costa Rica travel and Costa Rica vacations
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Occidental resorts stinks
Legislators, ministers and environmentalists joined yesterday in urging the central government to stand firm on its orders to close the Hotel Allegro Papagayo.
Last Wednesday, the 300-room Guanacaste hotel - which houses almost 600 guests - was ordered closed in 24 hours by officials from the Health Ministry, who had discovered clandestine pipes dumping sewage into an adjoining estuary, which leads to the Pacific Ocean.
The hotel appealed, stalling closure for almost five days, but yesterday Health Minister Maria Luisa Avila confirmed the order and said appeals had been denied.
Environment and Energy Minister Roberto Dobles also showed his support.
"This hotel must have a sewage treatment plant... and right now, that is not the case," said Dobles, citing the hotel's months of violations and warnings issued by Environment Ministry (MINAE).
Three hours later, legislators from the Citizen Action Party (PAC) gathered at the National Assembly, urging the immediate closure of the hotel and calling for more forceful compliance with the country's environmental laws.
"Our government institutions must fight to assure laws are followed. In this case, as in so many others in Guanacaste, the authorities don't intervene or they do it too late. Now is the time," said Guanacaste legislator Jose Rosales.
The hotel, part of the government-sponsored Papagayo Tourism Project in the northwestern corner of Costa Rica has long been hailed as "eco-friendly" by government officials and Costa Rican Tourism Institute (ICT) promotion.
Environmentalists, including the Guanacaste Brotherhood, the local environmental group that warned of the situation three weeks prior, and the Costa Rican Federation for the Environment (FECON), an umbrella group for almost 30 environmental groups countrywide, also showed their support for the hotel's closure.
"This has gone on long enough. The hotel is still not closed. The situation is outrageous, and we urge the government to take action now," said Gadi Amit, vice president of the Guanacaste Brotherhood.
Health Ministry officials first discovered the hotel dumping sewage into the neighboring estuary via hidden pipes in April. Two weeks later, hotel manager Guillermo Guerra assured them in a written letter that the problem had been "definitely solved."
Over the next few months, as reported Jan. 25 in The Tico Times, residents and government officials discovered the hotel was trucking its sewage to overburdened and often illegal dump sites throughout Guanacaste, transferring the contamination from its own estuary to neighboring towns.
Last week, after months of foot-dragging, the Health Ministry called for the hotel's closure until the hotel could prove operation of a functioning sewage treatment plant, a stipulation required in its original contract with the government.
By Dave Sherwood
Tico Times Staff
Labels: costa rica, travel
posted by Tian at 1:23 PM
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Occidental Hotel throws guests out
The Allegro Papagayo's Occidental resort recent news that it will have to close its doors due to the illegal dumping of waste water into the local estuary came with even more more surprise as guests were told that they would just be refunded their money back.
Arriving guests in the coming week found that they had had their reservations canceled and money refunded but had no where to go. You would think that the least that the Allegro Papagayo could do is upgrade them to their 5 star resort just across the bay at the Grand Papagayo, however legally the hotel does not have to do anything apart from refund their money.
This lack of care for its clients has left many people with a sour taste in their mouth. This is not the way to do business and especially not in Costa Rica. Everyone knows that what comes around goes around. In this case it smells very rotten and is ill managed.
Arriving guests in the coming week found that they had had their reservations canceled and money refunded but had no where to go. You would think that the least that the Allegro Papagayo could do is upgrade them to their 5 star resort just across the bay at the Grand Papagayo, however legally the hotel does not have to do anything apart from refund their money.
This lack of care for its clients has left many people with a sour taste in their mouth. This is not the way to do business and especially not in Costa Rica. Everyone knows that what comes around goes around. In this case it smells very rotten and is ill managed.
You have to feel sorry for the guest that had been waiting for months for his sunny vacation to Costa Rica to find out that a week before arrival he had been refunded his hotel stay and told to find somewhere else to stay.
Clients of some agencies are being swapped to other hotels, however this time of year is very busy and there is not a huge variety of hotels with space. People who booked not through an agency are left on their own and are trying to find space where ever they can so that their vacation is not totally destroyed.
Maybe one needs to think twice about booking a Occidental hotel stay in ANY country after their response to this disaster.
From Costa Rica Holiday
Labels: costa rica, travel
posted by Tian at 1:17 PM
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Allegro Papagayo Hotel CLOSED
On Tuesday Feb. 5th, the day after the Health Ministry denied the Allegro Papagayo's last appeals and called for the hotel's final closure, the news made national headlines.
The hotel was ordered closed last week after officials discovered hidden pipes pouring sewage into an estuary - the last straw in a long list of documented environmental offenses that began in April 2007.
The Citizen Action Party (PAC), the Ombudsman's Office, the presidential cabinet and all of the country's environmental groups rallied around the Health Ministry's decision to close the Allegro Papagayo.
By evening, virtually everyone had heard of the hotel's fate.
Everyone, it seemed, but the hotel's guests - left unaware in the all-inclusive bubble that has become the hallmark of most of the Papagayo Tourism Project's hotels.
Along the Allegro Papagayo's silky dark sand beach, littered only with pink shells and coconuts, The Tico Times interviewed seven guests, from Canada and the United States.
No one had heard the news.
"I had no idea the hotel was ordered closed," said a bare-footed Donna Murphy, of the U.S. city of Columbia, South Carolina, who just minutes before had watched as a howler monkey swung from limb to limb in a tree hanging over the beach.
"I came to Costa Rica because they do things right here," she said. "I just love the country."
Although her vacation at the Allegro might be cut short, she applauded the move. "I'd be more disappointed if they weren't going to close it down," she said.
The Costa Rican Tourism Institute has assisted in relocating guests left with no place to stay, according to officials.
"It's not the tourists that should be punished," said tourism minister Carlos Benavides.
According to Mario Calvo, director of the Health Ministry's Liberia regional office, officials will seal the hotel before week's end, to assure that "no more guests are fooled into believing it still open."
The closure, he said, will afford him and his inspectors time to investigate the rash of new contamination reports his office has begun to receive since the closure of the Allegro Papagayo.
"We have the support of the administration, and we will begin investigating every complaint we receive," he said.
From Tico Times
The hotel was ordered closed last week after officials discovered hidden pipes pouring sewage into an estuary - the last straw in a long list of documented environmental offenses that began in April 2007.
The Citizen Action Party (PAC), the Ombudsman's Office, the presidential cabinet and all of the country's environmental groups rallied around the Health Ministry's decision to close the Allegro Papagayo.
By evening, virtually everyone had heard of the hotel's fate.
Everyone, it seemed, but the hotel's guests - left unaware in the all-inclusive bubble that has become the hallmark of most of the Papagayo Tourism Project's hotels.
Along the Allegro Papagayo's silky dark sand beach, littered only with pink shells and coconuts, The Tico Times interviewed seven guests, from Canada and the United States.
No one had heard the news.
"I had no idea the hotel was ordered closed," said a bare-footed Donna Murphy, of the U.S. city of Columbia, South Carolina, who just minutes before had watched as a howler monkey swung from limb to limb in a tree hanging over the beach.
"I came to Costa Rica because they do things right here," she said. "I just love the country."
Although her vacation at the Allegro might be cut short, she applauded the move. "I'd be more disappointed if they weren't going to close it down," she said.
The Costa Rican Tourism Institute has assisted in relocating guests left with no place to stay, according to officials.
"It's not the tourists that should be punished," said tourism minister Carlos Benavides.
According to Mario Calvo, director of the Health Ministry's Liberia regional office, officials will seal the hotel before week's end, to assure that "no more guests are fooled into believing it still open."
The closure, he said, will afford him and his inspectors time to investigate the rash of new contamination reports his office has begun to receive since the closure of the Allegro Papagayo.
"We have the support of the administration, and we will begin investigating every complaint we receive," he said.
From Tico Times
Labels: costa rica, news, travel
posted by Tian at 1:01 PM
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