April 2023 Trip Notes & Itinerary

Overview: One week in Mexico City during Easter Week of 2023, visiting our daughter, Anna, who decided it would be a cool place to “work remotely” for a couple months.

Bottom Line: Mexico City is a huge, sprawling city with a population of more than 21 million people, making it the sixth largest city in the world. It also has an incredible cultural history, founded by the Aztecs in 1325 who, in turn, were conquered by the Spanish between 1519-21, when the Aztecs killed their own emperor, Montezuma, who they believed to be in league with the Spanish conquistador Cortez. Mexico City remained the capital of New Spain from then until Mexico’s independence from Spain in 1821 and has remained Mexico’s capital ever since.

While Mexico City has a reputation with some as a dangerous place, this is true of most large cities if you find yourself in the wrong place and aren’t careful. On the other hand, if you know where you’re going and are reasonably careful, it’s as safe as any other bustling metropolis. Mexico City’s “Centro” district is worth exploring by day with its great museums and ancient Mesoamerican ruins, and its upscale, leafy neighborhoods Roma Norte and La Condesa are easily walkable and feature beautiful architecture, sidewalk cafes, and a vibrant food, drink and nightlife scene. One week was just right for a first visit and provides plenty of time for taking in the food and art scene, seeing the major sights, and soaking in the atmosphere.

Highlights:

• Both places we stayed were fantastic and I’d recommend either highly. Casa Goliana is a fairly luxurious B&B, with beautiful furnishings and lovely staff. We moved to Oscar’s Airbnb so we could share a larger space with our daughter. Both were great bases for exploring the Roma and Condesa neighborhoods by foot or Uber. Be sure to hit Panaderia Rosetta for the best coffee and pastries in the neighborhood.

• Our guided, 3-hour walking tour of the Centro district was very cool, with highlights including the ancient ruins of Templo Mayor, magnificent Metropolitan Cathedral, Plaza de Santo Domingo and its Portal de Evangelistas, and Palacio de Bellas Artes. Having a local guide explaining the historical and cultural significance of what you’re seeing, not to mention the most efficient route to see them, is well worth the $20 tip.

• Exploring the Palacio de Bellas Artes requires a separate visit, as the walking tour doesn’t take you inside and it’s worth an hour or two. The artwork was unlike anything you see in Europe or the U.S. and it was really captivating. We loved it.

• A visit to Casa Gilardi, an architectural masterpiece of a home designed by Luis Barragán, is well worth a visit. Reservations for the free, self-guided tour must be made in advance with the owners who still live in the house.

• Casa Azul (the Blue House), once the home of legendary artists Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera and now home to the Frida Kahlo Museum, is a must-see experience. Even if you are not crazy about Frida’s art, her life story as told throughout the house and its gardens are undeniably fascinating. Lots of Rivera’s art throughout as well.

• Lunch at the San Angel Inn is a luxurious treat. Right across the street is the former art studio of Diego Rivera, now a small museum also worth a visit.
• On Saturdays, the Plaza San Jacinto, a leafy green park surrounded by colorful buildings, is filled with stalls featuring artists and craftspeople displaying and selling their wares. Next to the park is El Bazar Sabado, an indoor mini-mall filled with more art stalls, jewelers and even a pop-up craft beer bar.
• A side trip to the ancient city of Teotihuacan, home to the largest and most significant pyramids in Central America, is certainly worth half a day. Hiring a local guide can reveal interesting details you might otherwise miss, not to mention getting the history lesson in proper context. Wear sunscreen and a hat and be ready for the heat!

• The Museo Nacional de Antropologia is the largest and most visited museum in Mexico, filled with archeological and anthropological artifacts from Mexico’s pre-Columbian heritage.

• If you want to experience a different kind of Mexico City cultural institution, something completely off the wall, head out to the Lucha Libre wrestling matches at Arena Mexico. Even on a weeknight, the place was packed with families (tickets are less than $2) and the street outside is filled with vendor stalls selling replicas of the wrestlers’ famous masks. We only stayed 45 minutes as that was plenty, but it was a fun spectacle. Stop for a post-wrestling beer at Fonda Buenavista, a casual sidewalk bodega just a couple blocks away.

• Great food: Contramar may be the best seafood restaurant in Mexico City; get the whole fish with red and green sauce! Nosferatu has outstanding, creative pizzas (and El Grifo mezcal bar next door). Marmota is a very cool spot with a Pacific Northwest style in the middle of Mexico, with a huge, communal dining table facing the open kitchen with wood-fired oven. La Bodeguita del Media, a Cuban restaurant/bar and Hemingway hangout, has good food and drink and a fun vibe, including if you’re lucky like we were, Cuban troubadours to entertain you!

• Great cocktails: Mexico City is home to four of the World’s Top 50 Cocktail Bars (as of 2023), and Anna made reservations for us at them all. Handshake (#11) and Hanky Panky (#) were our favorites, but Baltra (#32) and Limantour (#4) were also great. Other watering holes I can recommend include La Clandestina in Condesa and The Trappist (excellent beers) right next door, El Grifo (artisan Mezcal and beers, next door to Nosferatu), and Monstruo de Agua, another outstanding craft beer joint.

• Music: Casa Franca has incredible live jazz, very high energy the night I went. Get there early to get a good seat, otherwise it’s standing room with obstructed views. But the music is incredible. Midnight Monkey in La Condesa is an old school kind of lounge bar with solid jazz, more chill and soulful than Casa Franca, but it could be different on other nights.

Random thoughts and tips:

• Contrary to popular belief, drinking water — or ice in your drinks — at any bar or restaurant is completely safe, as all such establishments have for years been using bottled or safely filtered water. This is by law, in fact, and even locals born and raised in Mexico City won’t drink tap water at home — it’s not safe for anyone.
• For getting around town, Uber is extremely reliable and extremely inexpensive — pennies on the dollar compared to the U.S. Avoid taxis, as these are known to be a risky proposition for tourists, including the possibility of robbery or kidnapping.
• For the fancy cocktail bars, it’s essential to get a seat at the bar to chat up the bartenders and watch “the show”. It makes all the difference, and reservations may be necessary. Otherwise, they can feel like little more than an overrated lounge with curiously built, very expensive drinks.
• Be warned: With an elevation over 7,000′, notorious air pollution, and generally hot climate during the day, Mexico City can be a bit uncomfortable for some (like me), and the often-broken concrete sidewalks — unmissable remnants of the city’s disastrous 1985 earthquake — make the act of simply walking around that much more of a challenge.