As I mentioned in an earlier post specific to Latin America, I attended the Luxury Travel Expo last week and got to hear what people in the industry had to say about the state of upscale travel in late 2009.

They were more upbeat than I expected, especially since travel to Europe has fallen off a cliff and the convention/incentive market is having a terrible year. And of course there are too many new hotels and too many new cruise ships for any of them to be much more than half full without major discounting. (Tough for them, good for you. There are some amazing deals on sites like LuxuryLink.com.)

Besides the obvious search for value though, lots of other interesting luxury travel trends came out that I thought were newsworthy.

1) More family travel
It used to be that “luxury” and “family travel” didn’t mix much, but that has changed in a big way. People are having kids later, they’re having fewer of them, and the grandparents often have more money than the parents do. I started noticing this shift a couple years ago when I’d go to a Four Seasons and find the pool packed with kids, but this has extended to safaris, soft adventure trips, and nature excursions. African safari operator Micato said in a panel discussion that their family travel bookings had gone from 10% to 35% in eight years. This bodes well for villa rental places and small-ship cruises, but not so well for cookie-cutter hotels that think connecting rooms are going to be enough to serve this demand.

2) Deeper travel experiences
It used to be that bragging about shopping in Paris or Milan was what you did to impress the neighbors. Now it’s more likely to be that you visited some place they’ve never even heard of or you did something worth talking about on your vacation. Adventure travel is way up, volunteer travel is way up, and travel to former pariah destinations is way up—to places like Colombia, Nicaragua, and Guatemala. Luxury travelers are becoming more like backpackers—wanting to mingle with real people and get authentic experiences instead of just being sheltered away in an artificial world.

3) Rising influence of green hotels and travel
Have you been paying more attention to the environmental practices of the hotels where you stay? If so you’re not alone. Tour operators are finding that guests are becoming steadily more demanding about how “green” the hotels are where they stay and are no longer looking at “luxury” and “eco-friendly” as being different things. Since Costa Rica is considered the birthplace of eco-tourism and a large portion of trips to Latin America are by nature lovers, parts of the Americas are perceived as being in better shape than many other parts of the world in this regard.

What has changed in what you are looking for when you travel now? What are you willing to pay more for…and not?

I’m a little late to the party with this New York Times article that came out October 25, but it’s a really good one that hasn’t lost any relevancy: Bargains in Latin America, Where Luxury Costs Less.

I feel like I wrote half of it myself over the past year, as I’ve been talking to anyone who would listen about the great deals on travel to Latin America. The dollar is still in great shape in a lot of places, the best luxury hotels are going for the price of crappy ones in New York or Paris, and you don’t get socked with those ridiculous fuel surcharges the airlines are profiting from for routes to Europe and Asia.

“In Mexico, some of the best deals are at ultra-luxurious megaresorts along the Riviera Maya, just south of Cancún, like Grand Velas, an all-suites resort and spa, which was just opening as the travel downturn hit. The Banyan Tree Mayakoba, where villas have their own plunge pools, is offering 50 percent off two-night packages with daily breakfast, a massage and dinner for two. Nearby, the Mandarin Oriental has a seven-night Holiday in Mexico deal that includes breakfast, airport transfers, dinner for two and a private yoga class from $354 a night until Dec. 18.

Not interested in the beach? Starting rates at the Four Seasons in Mexico City are $225 a night on weekends, not bad considering that it’s $70 cheaper than the Four Seasons in Austin ($295).”

The article highlights tour and spa deals throughout the Americas, including in Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, and Argentina. This won’t last forever, but you’ve probably got a good 8-9 months left to take advantage of the slump before the stock market rebound and improving company profits start getting people out of their houses and onto a plane again.

Las Alamandas

Many of the hotels we’ve tagged as the best luxury hotels in Mexico have gotten more kudos.

The AAA five-diamond awards are out and we’ve reviewed all but two of the winners in Mexico (a Fiesta Americana and JW Marriott that, in both cases, we found to be impersonal convention hotels). This is the strictest award system out there and here’s who came out on top:

Las Ventanas al Paraiso in Los Cabos
Four Seasons Hotel Mexico D.F. in Mexico City
Grand Velas All Suites & Spa Resort near Puerto Vallarta
Four Seasons Resort Punta Mita near Puerto Vallarta
Fairmont Mayakoba in the Riviera Maya
Occidental Royal Hideaway Resort & Spa near Playa del Carmen
Zoetry Paraiso de la Bonita Resort near Cancun

Grand Velas and Las Ventanas al Paraiso also scored first prizes in the Conde Nast Johansens Awards of Excellence. Here were the other winners in Mexico:

Hacienda Xcanatun near Merida
Las Alamandas in the Costalegre region

I spent 10 days in Mexico City this past month and I checked out all the top hotels we have reviewed, plus a few others that were possible contenders.

Our correspondent there, Shooka Shemirani, did a great job earlier when she tapped the top five hotels in Mexico City. The only one that was borderline that I am going to add is the J.W. Marriott. We have always featured its neighbor the W, but this one is for those more conservative travelers who don’t want to squeeze past the crowds at a hugely popular bar to get to their room. Plus only the Four Seasons has more Mercedes cars pulling in and out each hour.

I’m normally not a fan of Marriotts anywhere since they have traditionally been the ultimate cookie-cutter hotel chain. As I toured the brand new regular Marriott near the U.S. embassy, the PR person proudly told me that “all the furniture and fixtures were imported from the U.S.” That’s supposed to be a good thing—that the rooms in Mexico’s capital look just like the ones in Montclair, NJ? But this J.W. Marriott was actually built as a Mandarin Oriental originally and the rooms have enough of Mexico in them that you know where you are when you wake up in the morning. It’s also half the size of the InterContinental and Nikko hotels on the same block, so the service feels more personal.

The other hotel we’re adding isn’t open yet. It’s called Las Alcobas and is instantly going to be the best non-chain hotel in town when the first guests arrive in March or so. Its high-end restaurant, Nemi, is open already and is fantastic. Here’s a shot of one of the rooms.

When there is a notable new luxury hotel opening in Latin America, we try to get one of our correspondents in there to check it out. We recently posted a review of the brand new St. Regis Punta Mita resort, north of Puerto Vallarta in Mexico.

For many years the Four Seasons has had this beautiful peninsula to itself, but all along Punta de Mita was planned to be a multi-resort, golf, and real estate development project.

So what’s the difference in the two resorts? They can mainly be summed up as “kids” and “golf carts.” Upscale families love the Four Seasons and it shows. The resort had to build an adults-only pool (with no view of the sea) a few years back to appease couples trying to get away from the racket at the main pool. The kids’ club there is very popular. At the St. Regis, however, families aren’t the focus.

Also, you can get around this hotel fine on just your own two feet.

At 22 acres, the St. Regis is less sprawling than the Four Seasons, so you’re less likely to see golf carts whizzing around the property. This contributes to an atmosphere of appealing hushed elegance.

Don’t get me wrong: you are likely to have a lovely stay in this dramatic location no matter which of these two resorts you choose, assuming you’re prepared to drop most of your cash eating and drinking on site, far removed from Puerto Vallarta. But the key point is, now you can choose. Real the full review of St. Regis Punta Mita.