Hotels are on the increase in the Caribbean at a time when the long awaited recovery looks set to commence in 2004. In Santo Domingo the corporate orientated Hilton Santo Domingo, comprising of some 228-rooms, will open its doors in late spring of this year.Another Hilton property, the Hilton Barbados will open at the end of 2005.In Puerto Rico hotel occupancy increased in 2003 to pre 9/11 figures, a very positive and welcomed result reported head of the Puerto Rico Tourism Corp. Jose Suarez.Following a US$130 million investment, equating to an increase of 655 rooms in 2003, Puerto Rico’s business is beginning to boom. The rooms came in the form of three new properties including the 255-room Courtyard by Marriott in San Juan, which opened last January.Another popular addition was at the ever-growing resort of Vieques in the shape of the Wyndham Martineau Bay Resort & Spa, which opened its doors last February.This year will witness the opening of the first all-inclusive resort on the island, the Spanish owned Paradisus Sol Melia. Opening is scheduled for March. 5, yet at a recent press trip to the site in Rio Grande on the East Coast of the island, it appeared as if that pencilled opening could be a little imaginative.
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