Nefi and I took a weekend trip to Mexico to get out of the house and visit family in September shortly after Mexican Independence Day (September 15th). We spent our first night in Mexico city and the last two nights in Puebla and flew home the fourth day. It was a quick trip, but we had a great time eating our way through both cities since a lot of the usual tourist attractions were closed. Both Mexico City and Puebla are affordable and easy to navigate as you can walk or Uber everywhere. In part one we'll review what we did in Mexico City.
El Centro
Our flight landed and we took an Uber from the airport to our hotel. We stayed at the Hampton Inn and Suites Mexico City Centro Historico. It is affordable and in a great location to see the historic downtown area. They have a beautiful stained glass ceiling and a roof top terrace as well. We quickly headed out to eat and since it was a Thursday we went to find some Pozole. Pozole is a soup with hominy (corn) and the broth can be made red, green, or white depending on what is added and has chicken or other meat. Jueves Pozolero or Pozole Thursday originally started in Guerrero, but is popular throughout Mexico. We ate at La Casa de Toño, a popular chain restaurant well known for it's Pozole. A bowl of pozole starts at 65 pesos which is less than $3.50.
After dinner we walked by the Palacio de Bellas Artes (closed due to COVID) and explored the Zocalo and Madero Street. Madero Street connects Bellas Artes and the Zocalo. The Zocalo is home to the National Palace (government buildings), the Mexico City Cathedral and the museum of the Templo Mayor (closed due to COVID). You can still see some of the ruins of the Templo Mayor without entering the museum to the left of the cathedral. We finished our evening with some ice cream from Santa Clara which arguably has the best milk in Mexico which of course makes for some great ice cream.
Bosque de Chapultapec
Our second day started off rainy and gloomy which is common for Mexico City June through September. We first went to Chapultapec Park. This large park is similar to Central Park in New York City. There are nine museums in the park and we started off trying to visit Chapultapec Castle. The castle has been an observatory, a palace, and a fort, but is now home to the National History museum. Unfortunately it is currently closed due to COVID. After walking around the outside of the castle and the surrounding area we found the Museum of Modern Art was open still, so we headed that way. They told us they would let visitors in on the hour and we would have an hour to visit the current exposition and sculpture garden.
While waiting for our turn we decided to get some breakfast. Chilaquiles are a Mexican dish of tortillas that are fried and then covered in salsa with cheese and sour cream. They are often eaten for breakfast with eggs or meat. Born from the busy lives of the city's residents a torta de chilaquiles is a sandwich of chilaquiles making the dish portable and easy to eat on the go. Our favorite place to go for this Mexican street food is La Esquina del Chilaquil about a mile and half from the Modern Art Museum. When Nefi worked in the city he would often wait in a long line to pick up breakfast for the office. It's a popular spot with the locals and tourists alike.
With full bellies we were ready to escape the rain. Tickets for the Museum of Modern Art are 70 pesos a person or about $3.50. They spray you down with sanitizing spray before you enter and have you wipe your shoes on a mat with sanitizing liquid as well. There is plenty of hand sanitizer everywhere and they take your temperature in almost every building we entered. It was a quiet Friday morning and only a few other people were in our group so social distancing was easy. The exhibit had quite a bit of work by Diego Rivera and we enjoyed trying to spot his signature style and round faces that so often were found in his art.
Next up Puebla...
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