Million dollar hotel investments arriving in the country

Dreams Tides Resort & Spa comes to La Cruz with $ 125 million
Sol Meliá hotel opens in Papagayo and Hotel Pure builds another one in Sardinal

Sardinal de Puntarenas, La Cruz and the Gulf of Papagayo, in Guanacaste, will house three mega hotel projects  valued initially at about $ 300 million  total

These are the Dreams Tides Resort & Spa Costa Rica, Paradisus Papagayo Bay and   Hotel  Pure

The first will be located on a 1,500 hectare  property in  La Cruz, Guanacaste, and it will be  a five star hotel with 400 rooms, spa, meeting rooms, six restaurants, kids club, teen club and swimming pools surrounded by  vegetation, among other details.

The later  was confirmed to La Nation by Alejandro Zozaya, president of the international chain AMResorts, and Francis Durman, one of the partners

The project is scheduled to open its doors between 2013 and 2014.It  is valued initially at $ 125 million, and has equity participation of Costa Rican Ernesto Castegnaro, André Garnier, Francis Durman,  Nicaraguan Carlos Pellas (former senior partner of the BAC), and the powerful Panamanian  Motta family 

More investment: Another project that will be opened in Guanacaste is  Papagayo Paradisus Bay, in July 2013.It  will be operated by the  Spanish chain Sol Melia, which was in charge of  the Paradisus Playa Conchal until last April

According to a statement from Sol Meliá, the new five-star hotel will be developed on a 21 hectares property and it will feature 381 rooms, five restaurants, five bars and spa

Although the company did not disclose the amount invested , Gabriela Llobet, director of the Coalition for Development Initiatives (Cinde) estimates that this project will bring in to  the country $ 170 million

As a final point , the area of ​​Puntarenas Sardinal will  host the first Central American Hotel Pure said Eduardo Vilchez,  Pacific Mountains S.A representative ,  U.S. associate  of Oriens Travel & Hotel Management, owner of the trademark Pure

The new five-star Hotel Pure-whose investment was undisclosed by Vilchez­-- will rise in a property of 145 hectares, and it is expected to combine rooms, condominiums and villas

In addition, there would be a clubhouse, several pools with bars included, restaurants of international and Costa Rican  food , and a golf course with 18 holes, among other facilities

Currently, these three projects are in the stage of environmental impact studies and permits.

These projects join others like Studio Hotel ($ 6,000,000), which opened in June in Santa Ana, and Holiday Inn ($ 20 million), which recently opened operations in Escazú

Allan Flores, Minister of Tourism, was optimistic about these annoucements, which he said are consistent with an improvement in tourist arrivals to the country.

In 2010, 2.099 million people visited our country, compared to 2.089 million tourists who arrived in 2008, year which had the record visits.