Cancun trying to rebuild after Wilma

CANCUN, Mexico — The government promised Cancun would be three-quarters recovered from Hurricane Wilma by mid-December. But these days, bulldozers are easier to find than tourists in this beach resort.

Luxury hotels normally packed for the winter season are closed to all but construction crews. Most discos, mini-malls and swanky eateries are dark. And while the turquoise waters of the Caribbean are as inviting as ever, they have gobbled up much of the famed white beach.

The Dec. 15 goal set by President Vicente Fox after the late October hurricane was impossible, said Gabriella Rodriguez, tourism secretary for Quintana Roo state, which includes Cancun.

"You want to reopen. But then you discover the damage to your building is more extensive than it seemed, or the insurer doesn't pay you on time," she said.

Of the resort's 27,000 rooms, just over 10,000 are available as of mid-December. An additional 3,000 could be ready by year's end, but many of those are away from the beach.

Most resorts and restaurants plan to be back in operation by January or February, although some won't be fully up and running until March.

The loss of income will reverberate through Mexico's economy. Nearly 3.4 million people visited Cancun last year, many of them from the United States. Along with the Mayan Riviera coastline to the south, Cancun accounts for 38 percent of the country's tourism industry, Rodriguez said.

"Tourism is all we have," said Raul Hernandez, who runs a T-shirt and trinket stall. "Nobody's coming. Things are sad."

Much of the usually glittering hotel zone, a 15-mile spit flanked by the Caribbean and a freshwater lagoon, is a construction zone.

Mountains of smashed concrete rise alongside piles of trash bags. Plywood covers the pulverized glass facades of hotels and storefronts. Five-star rooms are piled with building materials or water-logged furniture.

Despite the construction, Cindy Moreno of Sacramento, Calif., stayed at the Hotel Riu Cancun for a week. "We had fun at the hotel, but the city's torn up," she said. "The night life is shut down. It's not what you expect from Cancun."

Crews with rusty wheelbarrows plant palm trees, but hundreds of dead or dying trees still sag in all directions.