OK, another minor inconvenience in a car that has been blessed with many issues in it's lifetime. Now, the hood release cable broke off the lever in the footwell. I can't believe how flimsy the sheet metal bracket that holds this in place is. I have to figure out how to open the hood without tearing down half the front end. Luckily, it occurred when I was not in a critical situation.
I have owned this car since new, and in 75,000 miles, I've never had a car with more issues. It's getting really old really quickly.

Once I get the hood open, how hard is it to replace the hood latch mechanisms?

Mark

Hood latch mechanisms broken? I doubt it. When my 07 was one month old the hood release cable stretched so much that it wouldn't pull the latches open. My Mini guy was able to get the hood open and then he replaced the cables.

Elvis, What is there to doubt? The mechanism in the footwell broke. Do you want pictures? I had noticed it was taking more effort to pull the latch the last time I popped the hood. This last time, the metal bracket that the pull lever attaches to broke. Today, I was able to fish out the cable, and use nose pliers to pull on the cable, while my wife pushed down on the hood. It opened after a few tries. The hood latches appear to be corroded to the point that it takes a lot of force to move the mechanism. I plan to tear them apart, and try to clean them up to reduce the friction.

If you have not pulled the panel over the hood release yet there are good videos on how to do it since that is the ECU for the lights is back in there. So the videos can be found under LED fog light installation.

I had the same problem on my 08, it was still under warranty so I took it in for them to fix. My 02 Jeep was getting harder and harder to open too so I sprayed the latch assy with WD-40 and it's worked great since then. As a result I spray WD-40 on my Mini too to keep those parts working smoothly.