This post is the first in a series about our adventures in Mexico and Central America – eight countries bound by the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, with beautiful beaches, hot jungle, active volcanoes, ancient ruins, historic towns, and mixed cultures. We are taking 3 short months to get around these countries, using buses, airplanes, ferries and taxis, and we are so looking forward to it.
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| Aztec dancers in Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
Our first country was Mexico which has a history dating back 13,000 years. Mexico has been ruled by various civilizations including Mayans, Aztecs, and Incas until it fell to the Spanish who ruled for 300 years. Since independence from Spain in 1821, Mexico has grown its own identity and become famous for its Mayan and Aztec culture and archaeological ruins, beautiful beaches, vast deserts, and tasty cuisine. It is also now home to around 130 million people.
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| View from our apartment in the historic centre of Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
Our first port of call in Mexico was Mexico City, a huge metropolis of around 22 million people. We arrived late in the day, and were very tired after our long flight from New Zealand. But our accommodation soon raised our spirits as our Air BnB apartment was modern, light, and bright, and had us right in the thick of things, in the historic centre of Mexico City.
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| Toward our local Oxo in the historic centre of Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
Arriving so late, meant that we’d had no time to buy dinner or breakfast goodies, so we explored our street and found an Oxxo store. Oxxo appears to be the local equivalent to a 7-Eleven where you can buy a small range of basic foodstuffs. All product labels were written in Spanish, but we amazed ourselves by how much Spanish we remembered from our two visits to South America a few years ago. Where we couldn’t figure it out, we used Google Translate.
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| The clothing and goods market in our street - historic centre of Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
The next morning, we woke to the reedy sound of an organ grinder’s music, the sing-song voice of the gas bottle man, and the tink and clang of ladles against pots as cooks drew attention to their food stall. It was a market and it was in our street. Fabulous! We could see men deftly manoeuvring their overloaded handcarts through the thick crowds, vendors waving around bolts of cloth, and sales-people surrounded by wire frames covered in clothing, shoes, toys and anything else you could want - it was an amazing amalgam of colour, sound and smell.
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| Street in the historic centre of Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
Excited by the vibrancy, we headed out to explore. But, Mexico City is built at an altitude of 2,240 metres above sea level, and we felt that altitude. Our legs and lungs felt like lead as we made our way around. Then we remembered our time in Bolivia's high altitude, where we learned that ibuprofen helps the body cope with altitude pressure. So, after taking ibuprofen we found it easier and had a great time exploring this clean, vibrant and fascinating city.
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| Metropolitan Cathedral in the historic centre of Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
We walked around the historic centre many times over our time in the city, enjoying the Spanish-style colonial architecture that has earned Mexico City UNESCO status. We particularly liked the imposing architecture of the Metropolitan Cathedral, the largest in Latin America. It sits on Mexico City’s huge main square called Zócalo. Surrounding and behind the Zócalo, were several pedestrians only streets, making it a great place to wander.
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| Top: Grand Hotel interior; Bellas Artes. Below: San Ildefonso; Postal, Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
Architectural highlights on our walk were the Grand Hotel, particularly its stunning interior; the attractive Palacio Bellas Artes with its colourful stained-glass ceiling; the elaborately decorated facade of the old College of San Ildefonso; and the imposing Palacio Postal. This city is full of interesting colonial architecture.
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| Top: Soumaya Museum; El Palacio de Hierro. Below: Plaza Suites & skyscrapers, Mexico City, Mexico |
To see more of this mega-city, we did a Hop-on Hop-off bus tour which showed us the more modern parts of the city. The tour included many monuments, one or two architectural stunners, and a lot of modern steel and glass buildings. It also took us out of the city centre to the quaint cobblestoned town of Coyoacan where we saw the homes and studios of artists Freda Kahlo and Diego Rivera (both UNESCO sites), and the interesting murals on the Central University (also UNESCO).
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| Tacos in Mexico City, Mexico |
We explored Mexico City’s cuisine too. We made our own light desayuno (breakfast) in the apartment, and went out for lunch and/or dinner. So far, we’ve eaten tacos, enchiladas, tortillas, and tostadas with various fillings; chorizo; re-fried beans, and home-made guacamole. We also enjoyed an interesting meat dish that was like a mixed grill that was smoky and served in the meat juices with soft tortillas. Yuuum!
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| Marg ready for our first taste of real Mexican tequila, Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
One of our dinner highlights was a 2 for 1 Margharita cocktail in a lovely up-market restaurant. It was our first taste of Mexico's tequila which is the country's national drink, and we really enjoyed it. We felt quite safe walking home that night, but a few nights later, we saw a political demonstration and noticed a large squad of the National Guard standing nearby.
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| Murals on shuttered shopfronts, Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
We also noticed some wonderful street art. Mexico City has a lot of memorials, statues, interesting bronze art, and other artistic items scattered throughout the city. But because it was late as we wandered home, the shopfronts were all closed up with roller-doors, and so we spotted some great murals painted on the doors. Each depicted the purpose of the shop, and the artwork was wonderful.
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| Marg at the Teotihuacán ruins (UNESCO), Mexico |
On another day, we Uber’d northeast of Mexico City to visit the Teotihuacán (pronounced teoːtiːˈwakã) archaeological ruins, once a huge city dating back to the 1st millennium BC that is now a UNESCO site. It consists of several amazing ruins of pyramids and a citadel, backed up with dwellings, all bisected by a large causeway called the ‘Avenue of the Dead’. This name came from the Aztecs who, when they discovered the abandoned city, believed it was paved with tombs.
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| Street with DHL office (far left), Mexico City (UNESCO), Mexico |
Back in the city a few days later, we bought something that was too fragile to fit into either of our suitcases. So we used a great deal of grey matter, language skills, and resourcefulness to source a box, wrapping paper, tape, and a DHL office to send it home. We thought we were doing really well until the lady at the DHL office showed us the price - we had forgotten to say it was not urgent and the courier cost outweighed the cost of our small purchase by more than 2,500%. Aaah well. We’ll have a good laugh about it when we get home.
This is our last day in Mexico City and tomorrow we head to Puerto Vallarta, which you can read about in the next blog.