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Published: June 15th 2013
Mexico
Celebrating day of the dead with a little bit of chocolateMexico and Mexico City especially has always held a small piece of Nikkie's heart. This is where her family is from and this is where she has done numerous a missions trip. This is also where I only hear stories of this much tequila and this many taco's and beans and chili by the truck loads and only speaking Spanish until...
The point is that pretty much everything mentioned above is the complete, complete opposite of me (I'm doing better on the chili's and tequila, but still no Spanish for me and I still have some choice words for beans since... Well let's just leave it at that before I get into trouble).
So since day one it has been a begging fest from Nikkie to go to Mexico City. I always used the violence as an excuse and there was always another trip to take, but I finally gave in. It was not so much giving in as just my sense of adventure and the fact that there are a lot of things in the book to cross off for Mexico so we had to start at some point right?? Right. And it worked out nicely that we
Mexico
Beautiful stained glass windows at a botanical garden could go over November 1 which includes the mother of all festivals - EL DIA DE LOS MUERTOS.
We caught the red-eye to Mexico City, met a couple family members (our hosts for the next 4 days) and immediately took off for Toluca - about 45 minutes from Mexico City. The sidewalks were packed with chocolates and other fun goodies - celebrating dia de la muertos - day of the dead. Let's get back to the chocolates. Every shape, color, size, and decoration you could imagine (but they all somehow end up in the form of a skull). Oh yeah and the chocolate is really good also. Watch out for the food hawkers all over the place selling everything you could imagine eating in Mexico. My personal favorite is the freshly grilled corn with a quick squeeze of lime and some cheese - yes cheese on corn and it is good. The parades and ceremonies celebrating this popular day go on and on. Just walking among the hordes and hordes of people is a complete experience in itself.
Well - my own "family christening" came that night. Nikkie's family was having a "small" gathering. This small gathering consisted
Mexico
More windows of more people than I have in my entire family. We were one of the first ones to show up. I thought this was gonna be easy - but then again there were no food in sight and there were a lot of tables packed out. Then the door bell started to ring. And again. And again. And again. And again. and again. The food kept coming in. The drinks kept coming in. The Spanish got more and more and louder and louder and before you know if I was engulfed in family wanting to know everything about me. We had a little problem though - I only spoke English and they only spoke Spanish (just a tiny issue). Well we made it through. We were tired, but oh I got to experience the "small family gathering". It was awesome - but I definitely will have to learn Spanish after this. Yeah - the food was awesome - beans, tortilla's, tequila, meat, tequila, beer, tequila (did I mention tequila yet). Yeah - it was that kind of night.
After a night of welcome rest we made it into the heart of MEXICO CITY. First stop was the ZOCOLO PLAZA.
Mexico
Close-up They always say the square is the life of the town. Well - here it is sort of an understatement. It being around day of the dead probably had something to do with it, but the place was packed. It was surrounded by buildings. We just stood there for a little bit and admired the chaos. Well - you can't miss the FLAG. It is huge, imposing and pretty awesome to see flapping in the wind. We quickly went into the METROPOLITAN CATHEDRAL for a quick look. Nothing spectacular, but cathedrals are always fun to look into to see the stained glass windows.
Next up THE NATIONAL PALACE. Probably the pride of the city. A very big building covering the entire side of the plaza. As you walk in one of the first things you see is the MURALS OF DIEGO RIVERA. Absolutely astonishing when looking at the detail and the size. The mural is mostly on the FOUNDING FATHERS and then the subsequent development of the country, but the detail of it is truly something to behold. Inside there is a little museum and a little square with a fountain. You're also able to walk through most of
Mexico
Day of the dead a little more fancy the rooms and see the grandeur of it all.
Next up was a little dinner at Restaurante el Cardenal. We ordered a lot of food and drinks (can't remember most of it), but I do remember us getting the mole and ANT ROE. The FLAVORS OF MEXICO CITY is definitely something to experience. Unfortunately we did not get to experience too much of it, but everywhere you look there are street vendors selling anything you can think off - some of it more attractive than others and some of it a little more recognizable than others. Most of our travels are surrounded with GREAT meals because we love to eat and we love to experience the food of other cultures. The highlight on this trip for me was the good old simple corn on the cob (on a stick) with some butter, lime and cheese (yes cheese). I've already mentioned the hordes of chocolates we bought. HUEVOS RANCHEROS was also high on the list and our family was nice enough to make it for us one morning for breakfast (basically tortilla, eggs sunny side up, drenched in a chili sauce with beans). One night we went out and had
Mexico
Statue from below somewhere in and around Mexico City dinner in an "outdoor cafeteria". No clue what these are called, but the streets were busy and then you just have these halls filled with all kinds of little stations. Anything from dessert, chilis, tacos, tripe, to coffee and fruit. Just pick your comfort food, wait for it to be prepared in 5 minutes or less and find a little communal seat and become best friends with the person next to you while downing your Mexican coke (not better anywhere else). Afterwards we went for a little walk and had some churros. I love churros. Especially churros with caramel (dulce de leche - love, love this stuff). And oh yeah the churro is like 80 cents and it is made right there in front of you (you pretty much burn your mouth eating it). Oh yes - I had 3 in about 5 minutes and suffered the consequences afterwards. In one of the books were CHEF MICHAEL MINA and his restaurant NEMI. Unfortunately this restaurant was closed so we did not get to enjoy his food. So that's it on the food front.
There are some other major touristy points to see while you are there. We got a
Mexico
The familia - a small gathering quick glimpse one night while driving around. First in line was the PASEO DE LA REFORMA - a massive avenue running from CHAPULTEPEC CASTLE to the plaza. After our pyramid excursion we made a mad dash for Chapultepec Park to see the castle before it closed for the day (it is a long steep walk). The Castle now also serves as the NATIONAL MUSEUM OF HISTORY. We made it just in time to see how the royalty once lived in Mexico City and to see what the Mexican history is about. Truly very impressive with views stretching for miles and miles. Next up was the ANGEL OF REVOLUTION MONUMENT which is also pretty cool to see - a little hard to access since it is right in the middle of this extremely busy avenue. And last but not least the TORRE MAJOR SKYSCRAPER which is the tallest skyscraper in Mexico. That's it for the modern stuff.
TEOTIHUACAN was next on the list. A 45 minute drive from Mexico City where you see house and after house after house and then you hit it. Out there by itself with nothing around. Not sure about the history of this, but I
Mexico City
Fine Arts Theatre know it goes way-way back. There are two massive pyramids - the PYRAMID OF THE SUN and the PYRAMID OF THE MOON linked by the AVENUE OF THE DEAD. The pyramid of the sun was a real pain in the ass to climb. Step after step after step. You get to one level just to find there are another one above (it's not that bad). We eventually made it to the top and the views were staggering. We stood there and you have to start wondering how these people survived and made do with what was available to them. As far as we could see there was no water in sight - hopefully for them there was water close by. The views were definitely breath-taking. We made our way down and walk down the avenue of the dead to the pyramid of the moon. Fascinating to think how this probably was considered the 5th Avenue of TEOTIHUACAN during the day. Lots of interesting construction, statues, faces, drawings. Unfortunately only half of the pyramid of the moon was accessible so we were only able to go half-way up. None-the-less it was really cool to sit at the very end of this
National Palace Mexico City
Diego Rivera mural depicting Mexico's history major pre-historic city. We sat down; put-up our feet and just looked/stared down this major avenue. It was a pretty cool site and pretty awesome to be surrounded by so much history. We slowly walked back to the MUSEUM AT TEOTIHUACAN which actually had some really cool pieces that was dug up from the ruins. There was a really "cool" area that displayed the dug-up skeletons of the inhabitants and then some really cool "rock-heads" that previously were attached to the buildings, but either fell-off or were taken off. All in all just an awesome day to walk around and explore.
Last but not least we explored the "hidden-gem" of Mexico City - FLOATING THROUGH XOCHIMILCO. XOCHIMILCO is one of the neighborhoods of Mexico City and it is "painted" with canals flowing through-out the neighborhood. So a brilliant mind decided to put some trajineras (big floating boat) on the canals, make them look all festive and pretty and rent them out. So we RENTED A TRAJINERA FOR A PICNIC. Each one can probably seat about 16 people if you pack them in and this is definitely a Sunday past time of the locals. You can just rent the trajinera
National Palace Mexico City
Diego Rivera mural depicting Mexico's history and bring your own food and drink or you can rent one and pick up everything you may need on your way through the canals. You also get your own little guide to steer you through the maze and make sure that you get back to the beginning safely. We dubbed ours "Huck Finn" since he looked to fit the part. It was delightful to just sit back and take in the banks of the canal with a Corona or Mexican coke in hand. There is an assortment of birds around and there is some really interesting scenery in parts. The Santana Barrea's Chinampa is an old house with "dead" dolls hanging from the tree branches. Definitely a very chilling feeling when we floated by there - fascinating, but extremely spine chilling to see hundreds of dolls hanging from the tree branches. On the banks are also some nurseries where you can buy plants and other little stores where you can stop and shop. There are plenty of restaurants. The floating mariachis are a big part of the canals. At times it can get hectic, because every few seconds someone will row up and try and sell you something. Selling
items to the "floaters" is a big support for this area. Anything from the mariachis, to food, to drink, flowers, religious symbols or other hand-crafted items. Definitely something I would highly recommend.
That was our visit to Mexico City. Obviously this was a little different than any of our other trips since we had full-time local guides (family) by our side the whole time. I won't lie - the crime and drug-wars was a major concern for me. It took me 5 years to finally say yes to a trip to Mexico. Having family and people that know the area obviously helped a tremendous amount. It would definitely have been a lot harder to do this by ourselves. We did have a really, really good time. The food was awesome and the people very friendly and helpful. I guess my only advice on this would be to avoid the taxis as much as possible. Again we did not take any taxis, but I have heard so many horror stories of taxi kidnappings - gangs pretending to be a taxi and then kidnapping you. Other than this advice I would say to definitely try and go around the time of
the celebration of the day-of-the-dead, because this is a somber yet magical time in this country.
Well we got to cross off 8 things in our books including Teotihuacan, El Dia de los Muertos, Floating through Xochimilco, Mexico City's Murals, Paseo de la Reforma, and Flavors of Mexico City. So 194 down and 5,587 to go.
From a chocolaty celebration of the dead
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Bob Carlsen
Great blog and writing...
I'm inspired to go to Mexico City even though I also have concerns about safety. And thanks for writing about a trip taken several years ago...and dating it appropriately. More TBers should write about their past trips, in between writing about new trips.