Mexico Crime Wave Scaring Away Sailors

Newport Beach (myFOXla.com) - Bloody waves of crime in Mexico are scaring away some of the sailors and finish-line spectators in the annual Newport to Ensenada yacht race, it was reported Sunday.     
   
The hundreds of murders caused by warring drug rings have caused some race entrants to cancel, and others to decide to skip having their families drive down to the Mexican seaport for the traditional post-race parties, the Newport Beach Daily Pilot reported.     
   
The "World's Largest International Yacht Race" has for 61 years drawn thousands of sailors and their families to the finish line at Ensenada, 70 miles south of the border, for parties and weekend boating festivities.     
   
"Everybody's concerned about all the violence and all that is going on down there," said race spokesman Rich Roberts, in an interview with the Newport Beach Daily Pilot. "It's just the idea of crossing the border.     
   
"You feel suddenly like you are in a very dangerous place."     
   
This year's race starts April 24, and the sponsoring Newport Ocean Sailing Association plans extra measures to make people traveling south comfortable. Organizers are chartering luxury buses to take spectators on the Newport Beach to Ensenada round trip.     
   
Extra police patrols will be on the toll road from Tijuana to Ensenada, and the Mexican tourism agency plans to concentrate "Green Angel" tourist assistance units on the freeway as well, the yacht club says.     
   
The Carnival cruise line is also scheduling one of its regular Long Beach to Ensenada cruises to be on hand for the finish.     
   
Thousands of cruise ship visitors disembark weekly in Ensenada for shore excursions without incident, and the Baja coast remains a popular tourist destination despite the horror stories about scattered violence against U.S. citizens, and frequent murders by drug gangs.     
   
The resort strip between the border and Ensenada is the target of an alert by the U.S. State Department for tourists to remain especially alert. Although dozens of drug-related murders have occurred this year, expatriots living along the coastal strip maintain the area is relatively safe for U.S. citizens.     
   
The Newport-Ensenada race is also being challenged in popularity by a competing race later this spring, that only goes as far south as San Diego, the Daily Pilot reported.