Isla Mujeres Vies to Keep Its Pueblo Mágico Status as Federal Review Nears

Isla Mujeres, Quintana Roo — Isla Mujeres is one of the 181 towns holding Mexico’s Pueblo Mágico (Magical Town) designation this year, and one of four in Quintana Roo, and municipal officials are working to ensure the island keeps the title.

Jessica Contreras Gómez, the municipality’s director of Pueblos Mágicos, said staff from every government department pitched in, each in its own area, to restore the island’s standing after its rating slipped during the previous administration because of infrastructure shortfalls — a decline that nearly cost Isla Mujeres the national distinction.

Contreras said the island has carried the designation for 11 years and that the current administration revalidated it with the goal of preserving the area’s historical, cultural and architectural heritage, along with its traditions and legends. Keeping the title, she said, reflects the work of every department.

Five criteria for keeping the title

The revalidation process weighs five areas, Contreras explained: planning and sustainable tourism development; investment, infrastructure and equipment; training, professionalization and quality; integrated promotion and advertising; and marketing.

She said the municipality submitted its completed file on Sept. 30 to state tourism officials, who will pass it to the federal Tourism Department (Sectur). Officials are expected to announce whether the island retains the designation at the next Pueblos Mágicos meeting, which begins Nov. 26 in Tamaulipas.

Sargassum watch and world-ranked beaches

With large volumes of sargassum a persistent threat, the municipal government operates a drone that monitors the coastline daily, allowing crews to respond immediately when the seaweed washes ashore. Municipal workers, tourism service providers and residents then remove it by hand, taking care to avoid damaging the sand, Contreras said.

The island’s wide coral-sand beaches regularly appear on international lists of the world’s best, most notably Playa Norte, which is regarded as the jewel of the Mexican Caribbean and has won multiple TripAdvisor Travelers’ Choice Awards, including a place in the global Top 10.

Contreras also noted that Isla Mujeres now has more than seven photogenic stops that draw visitors and cameras, describing them as strategic places to visit where the appeal lies less in color palettes than in offering the right settings for tourists to enjoy.