Program takes students on exclusive ride to Mexico

By LILIANA GARCIA

There are only two days left before spring break officially begins.

While some students can decide to stay home or travel Real World-style to Fiji, about 200 Fresno State students are heading south, vacationing in Rosarito Beach, Mexico.

The Spring Winter Action Tour Company (S.W.A.T.) specializes in student travel. For a fee ranging from $369 to $389, students get a hotel package, transportation to the destination and one free meal a day. Wristbands to certain events are also included.

Junior Jesse Hyde became a representative for S.W.A.T. this year. Hyde recruits students to sign up for the trip, and if representatives successfully recruit 10 people, they get a free trip. Hyde recruited 21.

The students he recruited were mostly his friends. When Hyde initially heard about the program, his plan was “just to get some friends to go and have an awesome time,” he said.

Hyde began recruiting his friends in early February and by March he was ready to go. “Once we jump on the bus, it’s just good times until we hit the campus on Thursday,” Hyde said.

Charter buses will pick up Fresno State students on Sunday. The buses will then head for Mexico.

Senior Terry Land, who will also embark on the trip to Rosarito Beach, will have his first taste of spring break out of the country.

“It is my last spring break, so I figured I should enjoy it,” Land said.

Land and Hyde will be going on the trip with the same group of about 30 friends.

Annie Pires, a freshman who studied in Brazil last year for spring break, will go along on the trip.

“I heard about this trip from my sister, who called me and told me I was going,” Pires said.

The most important thing to Pires isn’t the destination.

“Where you’re at is insignificant,” said Pires, who will have the company of her sister and friend Raegan Franks on the trip. “It’s who you are there with.”

Franks spent last spring break waterskiing in Tennessee. This year, her father is paying for her to spend a carefree spring break in Rosarito.

“My dad is really excited for me. He’s like, ‘Go, have fun,’ ” Franks said.

This is Franks’ first visit to Mexico.

“I’m most excited for all of the theme parties that are going to take place,” Franks said.

S.W.A.T. makes sure students’ days are filled with fun activities. The students are given rosters of the events that will take place at the resorts.

S.W.A.T. students can get to know each other on the first night with a meet and greet by the poolside.

There will be plenty of new faces to meet — about 1,500 to 1,800 college students from the S.W.A.T. program.

S.W.A.T. is in its eighth year, and all of the events S.W.A.T hosts are exclusive to the college students who purchase vacation packages.

“I feel pretty comfortable with the program,” Land said. “They have their own medical staff and customer service personnel.”