The one who comes out to cheer on the kids in the Pueblo Límite bowling alley is Fer Palacio.
The most wanted DJ at night on the Atlantic Coast puts on the first track and the kids start recording with their cell phones.
There are a lot of little lights pointing at it and it feels like it's the biggest disco, not only in Villa Gesell, but in neighboring municipalities, like Pinamar.
Now without chinstraps or vaccine control at the entrances, the show is once again the pre-pandemic postcard.
And yet, there is a fact: the capacity is not at 100 percent.
He doesn't even come close.
Nothing was the same again on the night of Gesell after the murder at the hands of a group of rugby players of the 18-year-old teenager,
Fernando Báez Sosa
, on January 18, 2020. First, he no longer follows the same offer, with Le Brique closed since then and while the trial in Dolores continues.
Second, demand also dropped.
Groups of friends under 25 prefer other vacation destinations.
"There is a change in the habits of the boys who travel with their parents, who out there have a calmer profile, and the number of young people in a group dropped considerably,"
Gesell's Secretary of Tourism, Marcelo Iglesias , confided to
Clarín .
The municipal official also clarified that, although he does not have the statistical data, the decrease in boys and girls of those ages is a fact that "is verified in the streets and beaches" of the city.
In Gesell, the last official tourism report corresponding to January 7 shows an occupancy level of 92%.
The Le Brique bowling alley is still closed, after the murder of Fernando Báez Sosa.
Photo Germán García Adrasti / Special Envoy
To give a reference, just the case of a kiosk located just meters from the Dixit bowling alley, the only nightclub open in addition to Pueblo Límite in Gesell for three summers.
“Before, in 2019, the number of guys all night was impressive, so I was open 24 hours a day.
Today,
at 3 in the morning, there is no one left, so I close it
, ”says a merchant behind the counter.
An important source linked to the Gesell night, who asked not to be named, assures that "there were no concrete measures from the municipality that would harm the sector", but it does feel that there are fewer young people.
In Dixit, he assures, the capacity (around 700 people) is at 80 percent, as it was in 2019. "But that is with one less player in the downtown area of Gesell, as Le Brique was," he affirms.
And he continues: “Today Gesell is no longer the first place that the boys chose to have their first vacation.
It doesn't happen anymore.
That went to Pinamar and Mar del Plata
.
And I am not clear why.
Last year there was talk that the Municipality was going to have a policy to discourage young audiences, but I didn't see that.
There were no changes nor bother us.
That way yes, so many police are scary ”.
Fer Palacio played in Pueblo Límite this Tuesday.
Photo German Garcia Adrasti / Special Envoy
Both in front of Dixit and Pueblo Límite
Clarín
verified this week the presence of dozens of police officers guarding the main accesses.
It has already been seen since 2021, when the municipality began to coordinate with the different Buenos Aires Police forces affected by Operative Sol the control of the entry, exit and transit of young people who attend the two nightclubs.
This summer, in Gesell there are a thousand agents, from different specialties, 50 patrol trucks, 65 GPM motorcycles, 4 quadricycles that travel the beaches between 6 and 8 in the morning, added to four 4x4s from the municipality that do prevention on beaches and the city, as reported to
Clarín
by the municipal security secretary, Lucas Anderson.
In Pueblo Límite they also recognize the decline in the public of "the first vacations."
“It went down a lot.
At least, there are
30% fewer boys than in 2019
”, the last year before the homicide of Báez Sosa and the pandemic, assures
Clarín
Pablo Martin, manager of the nightclub and believes that it is partly due to the fact that “there are fewer proposal”, without Le Brique or new nightclubs in the area.
The third weekend of January is always the strongest and Martin believes that then it will reach a capacity of 6,000 people at 100%.
For the moment, the nights with the most attendance at the mega-disco with capacity for 7,000 people were those of the La Joaqui recital, on January 9, with 4,000 people, and that of Fer Palacio, on January 10, with more than 3,000 , that is to say to 50 percent of the capacity.
"At least, there are 30% fewer boys in Gesell," they say from Pueblo Límite.
Photo German Garcia Adrasti / Special Envoy
The bowling alley, which also stands out in the area for bringing together international artists such as John Digweed (January 19) or Nick Warren (January 26), has a closed circuit with 96 cameras, as well as a clinic with a defibrillator and doctors to any inconvenience, an ambulance that stands guard all night at the door of the premises and 45 private security guards, who work inside the place.
Mar del Plata: younger than other years
La Feliz arrived last summer, 2022, to break a historical record of tourists, with 9 million travelers from different parts of the country, and from the Municipal Tourism Entity of Mar del Plata (Emtur) they trust that the number will also be replicated. this season.
"At least, we are already starting at the same rate,"
the president of Emtur, Bernardo Martin, assures
Clarín , noting that the presence of young tourists is a prominent factor in these numbers.
“This year, 20% of the people who come to Mar del Plata are between 19 and 29 years old, when before the pandemic they were 14%,” he assured.
The Pueblo Límite bowling alley, with 7,000 square meters, has capacity for 6,000 people.
Photo German Garcia Adrasti
How many in the whole town?
Martin makes reference to the nightclubs in the central zone, Playa Grande, and affirms that this year "around
35,000 boys gather every night
, with an active policy of the state taking care of it."
For the official, the increase in the number of young people is related to several factors, such as the "boom" of Chapadmalal, as a new "tourist pole for the ABC1 segment";
the “more than 50 massive events”, between parties and international shows, scheduled only for January, and the early opening to nightlife and gastronomy that the district had in the midst of the pandemic.
“Boys from 18 to 23 are coming to Mar del Plata alone, but also with their families, who find a new redoubt in Chapadmalal, where they have access to southern beaches, where parties are being held.
It is a new phenomenon for the city, ”he considered.
Villa Gesell. special envoy
MG
look too
Mar del Plata vs.
Pinamar: how much is needed to eat on the beach
Chapadmalal: the formula that made it a fashionable destination with options from $2,000 to $200 a night