travel guides mexico city

Your Friend the Nomad

Mexico City Travel Guides

Whether you have a few hours or a few weeks in Mexico City (Ciudad de México or CDMX for short), you’re in a for a real treat! I’ve been able to explore this greenery-filled metropolis on over five trips and it never gets old — there is always plenty to do and plenty to eat!

My Favorite Mexico City Travel Guides

💎 Mexico City Off The Beaten Path: 21 Hidden Gems

🌮 39 Best Mexico City Vegan Restaurants by Neighborhood

Mexico City Trip Planning & Preparation

✈️ How to Prepare for Your First Time in Mexico City

🧳 The Ultimate Mexico City Packing List

💃🏽 What to Wear in Mexico City for Women & Men

🗺 Mexico City in 4 Days: The Quintessential CDMX Itinerary

Mexico City Neighborhood Guides

🌿 The Ultimate Guide to Roma Norte, Mexico City

🌹 The Ultimate Guide to Zona Rosa, Mexico City

Activities & Day Trips from Mexico City

🚠 How to Ride the Mexico City CableBus As a Tourist

🌆 10 Best Views in Mexico City (Rooftop Bars + More)

🛶 Highest-Rated Xochimilco and Frida Kahlo Tours

👙 The Best Water Activities in Mexico City and Nearby

🗼 How to Visit Mirador Torre Latino in Mexico City

🏺 Worth It? Diego Rivera’s Anahuacalli Museum in Mexico City

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Mexico City

A high-octane megalopolis boasting old-school cantinas, intriguing museums, inspired dining and boating along ancient canals, Mexico City is the sun in the Mexican solar system.

Best Time to Visit

Best things to do, leave the planning to a local expert.

Experience the real Mexico City. Let a local expert handle the planning for you.

Attractions

Must-see attractions.

Palacio de Bellas Artes

Alameda Central

Immense murals by world-famous Mexican artists dominate the top floors of this splendid white-marble palace – a concert hall and arts center commissioned…

Palacio Nacional

Centro Histórico

As the seat of the federal branch of the Mexican government, the Palacio Nacional (National Palace) is home to the offices of the president of Mexico and…

Torre Latinoamericana

The Torre Latinoamericana was Latin America’s tallest building when constructed in 1956, and remains the dominant focal point of Centro Histórico. It's an…

Museo Frida Kahlo

Coyoacán & San Ángel

Renowned Mexican artist Frida Kahlo was born in, and lived and died in, Casa Azul (Blue House), now a museum. Almost every visitor to Mexico City makes a…

Templo Mayor

Before the Spaniards demolished it, the Aztec 'Great Temple' Teocalli of Tenochtitlán covered the site where the cathedral now stands, as well as the…

Museo Casa Estudio Diego Rivera y Frida Kahlo

If you saw the movie Frida (2002), you’ll recognize this museum, designed by Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera's friend, architect and painter Juan O’Gorman…

Museo Casa de León Trotsky

The Trotsky home, now a museum, remains much as it was on the day when one of Stalin's agents, a Catalan named Ramón Mercader, caught up with the…

Museo Mural Diego Rivera

This museum is home to one of Diego Rivera’s most famous works, Sueño de una tarde dominical en la Alameda Central (Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in the…

Top picks from our travel experts

10 top things to do in mexico city.

Xochimilco Canals

Hundreds of colorful trajineras (gondolas) await passengers at the village’s 10 embarcaderos to paddle you through the waterways dotted with birdlife and…

Biblioteca de México

Mexico City's mega-library holds over 500,000 volumes and an extensive maps collection. Design and architecture fans should visit just to witness the…

11 of the best free things to do in Mexico City

Museo Soumaya

Polanco & Bosque de Chapultepec

Someone ought to tell Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim that bigger isn't always better. Named after his late wife, this six-story behemoth (plated with 16…

Museo Nacional de las Culturas del Mundo

Constructed in 1567 as the colonial mint, this renovated museum exhibits the art, dress and handicrafts of Mexico's and the world’s cultures. Mixed in for…

Palacio Postal

More than just Mexico City’s central post office, this golden palace built in 1907 is an Italianate confection designed by the Palacio de Bellas Artes’…

Ex Teresa Arte Actual

Mexico City was built atop a sloshy lake bed and it's sinking fast, as evidenced by this teetering former convent. The 17th-century building now serves as…

Plaza Garibaldi

Every night the city’s mariachi bands belt out heartfelt ballads in this festive square. Wearing silver-studded outfits, they toot their trumpets and tune…

Museo Jumex

Museo Jumex was built to house one of Latin America's leading contemporary art collections. Temporary exhibits draw on a collection of around 2600 pieces…

The heart of Mexico City is the Plaza de la Constitución. Residents began calling it the Zócalo, meaning ‘base,’ in the 19th century, when plans for a…

Created in the late 1500s by mandate of then-viceroy Luis de Velasco, the Alameda took its name from the álamos (poplars) planted over its rectangular…

Catedral Metropolitana

One of Mexico City’s most iconic structures, this cathedral is a monumental edifice: 109m long, 59m wide and 65m high. Started in 1573, it remained a work…

Castillo de Chapultepec

A visible reminder of Mexico’s bygone aristocracy, the ‘castle’ that stands atop Chapultepec Hill was begun in 1785 but not completed until after…

Zona Rosa & Reforma

The symbol of Mexico City, known as 'El Ángel' (The Angel), this gilded Winged Victory on a 45m-high pillar was sculpted for the independence centennial…

Tianguis Cultural del Chopo

A gathering place for the city’s various youth subcultures – especially goth, metal, indie and punk – with most of the outdoor vendor stalls selling new…

Basílica de Guadalupe

A cult developed around this site after a Christian convert named Juan Diego claimed in December 1531 that the Virgin Mary appeared before him on the…

Planning Tools

Expert guidance to help you plan your trip.

Things to Know

Be a better traveler with this guide to health, safety and etiquette in Mexico City.

Best Neighborhoods

Location is everything in Mexico City, and we've put together a list of the best neighborhoods that are easily walkable and full of charm and character.

While there is plenty to keep you busy in Mexico City, the central region of Mexico is filled with pueblos mágicos that are well worth your time. 

Money and Costs

If you want to visit Mexico City but have a tight budget, these practical travel, accommodation, and going-out tips have got you covered.

Transportation

Whether it's cycling, tackling the sprawling subway, or crossing the city by cable car, here is how to navigate Mexico's mighty capital.

Free Things to Do

Stretch your pesos even further with our round up of the best free things to do in Mexico City.

Spending Diaries

A detailed diary of how to book accommodation, take in superb museums and eat very well in the Mexican capital for under $500.

Traveling with Kids

Heading to Mexico City with your kids? Check out these top family-friendly activities and tips for planning your trip.

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Experience the real Mexico

Let a local expert craft your dream trip.

Latest stories from Mexico City

Food and Drink

Mar 21, 2024 • 6 min read

The best bites that locals love in Mexico City.

Mar 16, 2024 • 5 min read

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Mexico City and beyond

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The 27 Best Things to Do in Mexico City

By Scarlett Lindeman

Mexico City is changing rapidly from the influx of foreigners who have recently discovered the city’s infinite charms. There are dozens of new restaurants, parties, and projects that keep the vibrancy of this capital city (with a population of over 22 million) surging while the storied museums, ancient bars, and cultural sites maintain their standing. An intoxicating mix of ancient and new, you could spend a lifetime here and barely scratch the surface. While there's no way you’ll manage to cover all of the must see and dos in one trip, sticking to one neighborhood a day keeps things manageable. No matter how you end up spending your time in Mexico's capital, one thing is for sure—you’ll be scheduling your second trip before your first is even finished.

Read our complete Mexico City travel guide here .

This gallery has been updated with new information since its original publish date.

All listings featured on Condé Nast Traveler are independently selected by our editors. If you book something through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Colonia Juárez Arrow

The Juarez neighborhood has evolved in recent years. Once gritty, the area is now teeming with great boutiques, bars, parks, and restaurants like Masala y Maiz, which blends Mexican and Indian cuisines, and Niddo, a sunny corner spot that serves a divine brunch. There are loads of hotspots around the leafy central Plaza Washington: La Rifa for artisanal chocolates, Loose Blues for vinyls and vintage denim, and Elly's for natural wines and handmade pastas.

Luis Barragán House and Studio Arrow

The former home and studio of Pritzker-Prize-winning architect Luis Barragán has been transformed into a museum in Mexico City's Hidalgo District. Architecture and design lovers frequent the estate to study the artist's ingenious use of color, light, shadow, form, and texture. From the street, you'd never guess the personality that lies inside: The stark-gray façade humbly blends in with neighboring homes, but walk to the interior of the estate and you'll find striking walls in a kaleidoscope of bright colors, fountains, and pools.

Gran Hotel Ciudad de México Arrow

Even if you're not staying at this hotel on the Zócalo, it's worth stopping just to see the jaw-dropping interior. The building originally opened as a department store in 1899. Since then, its art nouveau bones have been carefully maintained: The curving staircase is a replica of the one at Paris's Le Bon Marché , and the antique elevator, made of iron and concrete, was the first of its kind in Mexico City. But the pièce de résistance is the incredible Tiffany stained-glass ceiling, imported from France in 1908.

El Moro Churerría Arrow

Early evening is churro time in Mexico City—families, couples, and friends all go out for a taste of sweet fried dough and chocolate. You'll often find lines snaking around the block outside this beloved churrería (churro shop). There are shops in Roma, Centro Historico, Condesa, Polanco, and Cuauhtémoc.   Most have spiffy interiors with blue and white tile, bright lighting, and long communal tables. Watch the cooks dip, fry, and sugar-coat your long, spindly churro, which is paired with hot chocolate in a flavor of your choosing.

CNT Editors

Blane Bachelor

Kyler Alvord

Floating Gardens of Xochimilco Arrow

Drive 40 minutes south of the city and you'll witness the closest approximation to the Valley of Mexico (in which Mexico City lies) before the arrival of the Spanish. The World Heritage Site of Xochimilco, the extensive lake and canal system that once connected most of the settlements in the valley, is an incredible vestige of the area's pre-Hispanic past. Start at the Embarcadero Belem dock to board a colorful gondola -like boat, called a trajinera , and explore the waterways and artificial islands or chinampas .

Palacio Nacional Arrow

Diego Rivera's famous mural The History of Mexico, showcases the Aztec era to the conquest to the Revolution to the development of industry. It's grandiose and captivating, a unique opportunity to learn about Mexico's past. Not to mention it's free: The mural is housed in a distinguished building east of the Zócalo that operates as a government office. Among the office workers milling about, you'll see a mix of local, national, and international tourists who come to be awe-stricken by Rivera’s masterpiece.

Templo Mayor Arrow

Templo Mayor (translation: main temple) was the centerpiece of Tenochtitlán, the ancient Aztec capital, constructed in 1325 in the marshes of Lake Texcoco. The temple was mowed over and replaced by a cathedral during the Spanish conquest in 1521. Today, the hulking stone ruins lie at the heart of Centro Histórico, embedded in the blueprint of downtown. Surrounded by streets and buildings, it is hard to imagine the temples in their original Aztecan glory, but the nicely organized museum helps paint the full picture.

Museo Frida Kahlo Arrow

The museum, also known as "Casa Azul" for its shocking cobalt blue exterior, is where Frida Kahlo was born, raised, lived, and died. Visitors can take in a few paintings by Kahlo and her husband, Diego Rivera, in addition to other contemporary artists of their era. But perhaps more interesting is the voyeuristic window into their creative world. The home is carefully preserved and maintained; it's easy to image the spaces as they were during Kahlo's time. In addition to their personal effects and domestic materials, the collection of clothes and corsets Frida needed to support her body after her traumatic accident give an intimate look at the artist's daily struggles.

Sculpture Garden at the Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo Arrow

Located on the outskirts of Mexico City proper, at the National Autonomous University of Mexico campus, the Sculpture Park is totally off the tourist track. Featuring a range of grand outdoor sculptures, the park is best explored by foot. The sculpture space, which looks like a giant crater, is one the top things to spot. It's built around lava (which can be seen in the center) and has wonderful views from the ledge.

Mercado Jamaica Arrow

The city’s principal flower market offers visitors a fragrant, colorful walk through much of the region’s native flora and fauna, available to be bundled into a bouquet and taken back to your home. Available for your admiration are roses, lilies, daisies, ferns, and violets galore, among other rare and special species. Visit during Dia de Muertos to see trucks carting in pink and orange cempasuchil , or Mexican marigolds, for family members to buy to decorate their ofrendas at home or their loved ones’ graves. Build a bundle to decorate your hotel room with—or better yet, to dry and frame as a memory for when you return home.

Monumento a la Revolución Arrow

This landmark, located in the heart of Mexico City, commemorates the Mexican Revolution and is the largest triumphal arch in the world. The main structure evolved over twenty-five years of stops and starts and a major redesign. It was finished in 1938, to comprise an eclectic blend of art-deco and Mexican socialist realism styles. A visit to the top observation deck only costs 110 pesos ($5) and there's a museum underground. You don't need much time to witness the glory of the monument. Saunter around, gawk at the creative architectural stylings of the structure, and walk under the arches. History nerds may be more interested in the small museum below, but more than anything it's an architecturally significant piece, and the observation deck has great views. If you keep your eyes peeled while exploring around town, you'll most likely catch a glimpse of the monument down a main street—but a quick glimpse isn't enough, and it's worth the quick 15-minute trip to walk underneath it.

Omusubi House Arrow

In a small storefront in Roma Norte, the husband and wife team, Ichiro Kitazawa and Varia Gonzáles Manuel work side-by-side in the miniscule kitchen, cupping steamed rice into palm-sized balls. They will sink sauteed sweet potato into the omusubi which are speckled like confetti with purple and wild rice, a marriage of Mexican ingredients and Japanese technique. They met while working at a Japanese restaurant years back when Mexico City was still called DF, the federal district. He had arrived ten years earlier by way of Osaka, as a hippy backpacker intent on photographing Latin America but fell into cooking; and she, from Puebla. “Omusubi translates to tying up or to bring together” Kitazawa explains, “which is how we wrap the rice”—and a sound metaphor for the forging of connections between their two countries.

Cárcamo de Dolores Arrow

Second or third-time visitors to Mexico City who think they've seen everything will find something new here. This historic but infrequently-visited site was constructed in 1951 as a hydraulic water system connected to the city's main water lines. And while it no longer acts as a municipal water work but rather a museum and cultural landmark, it underscores the city's complicated relationship with water. In the lesser-traveled section of Chapultepec, it is currently under renovation and closed to the public, though the massive Rivera sculpture of the Azteca water god Tlaloc out front can still be admired.

Eat Like a Local Arrow

Eat Like a Local, a Mexico City–based company, runs culinary tours that immerse visitors in the city's vast food scene. Rocio, the guide, has long been a food blogger , and her knowledge about the Mexico City's food scene is totally on point. She's also passionate about connecting tourists with locals, and impacting Mexico City in a positive, sustainable way. There's a set itinerary, but she's flexible—so go on, order another mezcal or pork carnitas, if you like.

Museo Jumex Arrow

Museo Jumex houses one of Latin America's largest private contemporary art collections, which includes works by Andy Warhol, Martin Kippenberger, Cy Twombly, and Damien Hirst. Mediums range from paintings and drawings to light and video installations. The building is as distinctive as the art: British architect David Chipperfield designed the 15,000 square-foot white-concrete cube with a sawtooth top. (Plus the Soumaya Museum is just across the square, so you can feed two birds with one scone.) 

Self-Guided Centro Historico Cantina Crawl Arrow

It's easy to pop around in Centro, hitting up a few cantinas to have a drink or two and to soak up the style of these classic, dive-y spots. The more friends you bring and make, the better. Locals and regulars alike hit the cantinas, which maintain a storied baseline for the drinking culture of Mexico City. Musicians pass through, sorrows are drowned, and gains celebrated. Many cantinas serve food, some better than others, and will often gift snacks and small plates if you consume around three drinks, though each spot has its own rules. Beer and tequila prevail. Simple cocktails, built-in-the-glass rum and cokes, margaritas, sangria, rum, brandy, and mezcal. Some cantinas are known for certain drinks, but craft cocktails this is not.

Lucha Libre at the Arena Coliseo Arrow

A giant venue that hosts sporting and entertainment events, the Arena seats as many as 23,300 spectators. It's best known for hosting Lucha Libre wrestling matches. The stadium is sprawling, and some seats are certainly better than others, depending on how much money you're willing to fork out. If you're here because you're a true Lucha Libre fan, make sure to sit in the front row; if you're here to have a fun night out with friends, the cheap seats will do just fine.

Teotihuacán Arrow

The ancient Mesoamerican pyramids of Teotihuacán, in the Valley of Mexico, once served as the largest city in the pre-Columbian Americas. It is thought that during the first millennium A.D. the city had around 125,000 people, including multi-ethnic groups such as the Otomi, Zapotec, Mixtec, Maya, and Nahua. If you have a few days in Mexico City, it's worth the day trip . (Teotihuacán is about an hour outside the city by car.) Leave early in the morning so you can be back in the city by mid-day—and bring sunscreen!

The Centro Zocalo Historico Bodealores   Arrow

The boleadores are dotted around the perimeter of downtown's main square (and almost every other park and plaza in the city) but you'll have a great view of the cathedrals, flagpole, and Palacio Nacional if you get your shoes shined here. Climb up on the elevated perch of the boleador's chair and they will make your boots shine anew. At 50 to 100 pesos ($3 to $6), it's one of the cheapest shoe-shine experiences around. Boleadores are an important part of Mexican street culture and a fixture of pedestrian avenues, a living-breathing mid-century heritage that is not in danger of dying out. But with the proliferation of cheap plastic shoes and mass-market tennis sneakers, "limpiabotes" are a hand-crafted service for giving leather shoes a new life.

Museo Anahuacalli Arrow

Awesome, grand, and out-of-the-way, Anahuacalli is part studio, part museum, and part shrine for Mexican art that Diego Rivera built as an architectural piece uniting past, present, and future to the natural environment. Rivera's personal and expansive collection of pre-Hispanic figurines, carvings, and totems accumulated over a lifetime. The museum itself was constructed around a swath of rocky terrain Rivera and Khalo had purchased for a farm. The main collection features nearly two thousand figurines representing Olmecs, Toltecs, Nahuas, Zapotecs, the people of Teotihuacan, and those of northeastern Mexico as well as Rivera's sketches for murals. There are also temporary exhibits of more modern Mexican artists, with a recent rotation of 30 textural works by Robert Janitz—paintings, large-format sculptures, and an NFT.

Patrick Miller Arrow

From the outside, this dance club looks like dumpy warehouse hidden behind a black gate in Roma Norte. But come on a Friday (the only day it's open), and you'll find a raging party that offers a glimpse of the city's extant disco subculture. An eclectic mix of party-goers show off their moves in dance circles to all kinds of music, from '80s and '90s classics to sub-genres of disco, such as Hi-NRG, Italo, and electro.

Museo Nacional de Antropología Arrow

This massive building in Chapultepec Park is among the city's most famed museums, second only to perhaps the Museo Frida Kahlo . Though the late Mexican architect Pedro Ramírez Vázquez designed it in 1964, the mammoth building still looks as avant-garde today as it did then. (How exactly does that giant concrete slab float above a pond?) The museum holds the world's largest collection of ancient Mexican artifacts. Some of the most iconic Mesoamerican artifacts discovered to date can be found across 23 rooms. If you want to understand Mexico's history, then a visit here is a must.

Plaza Garibaldi Arrow

Mexico's roving mariachi bands have been found in this plaza, a few blocks north of the Palacio de Bellas Artes , since the mid-1900s. Though the plaza has deteriorated over the years, it's seen a resurgence thanks to a city-driven effort to clean up the neighborhood by installing new sidewalks and street lamps. It's a cultural meeting point of sorts, where travelers can come day or night (though the best time to go is after 11 p.m.), to watch bands solicit bar patrons, cars, and passersby to buy a song .

Torre Latinoamericana Arrow

This 44-story skyscraper, built in 1965, is the tallest building in Centro Histórico . The tower miraculously withstood both the 8.1-magnitude earthquake of 1985 and the 7.1-magnitude quake of September 2017, making it a rare feat of engineering. The Torre defines Mexico City's skyline (much like the Empire State building in New York) and is a useful tool for orienting oneself in downtown. Head to the top-floor observation deck for jaw-dropping 360-degree views of the city, or to the newly renovated bar/restaurant (one floor below), which has equally impressive views and is almost always empty.

Salón San Luis Arrow

The dance floor at this old-school salon, cloaked in red light, comes alive as locals, tourists, and old timers twirl and shuffle to a live band . Try your hand at salsa, merengue, cumbia, and norteña numbers as waiters in crisp whites with black bow ties circle the room serving liquid courage. There's no shame in bad dancing, so try and learn the steps. (The pros might even show you a thing or two.)

Iglesia San Ignacio de Loyola Arrow

A surprisingly tranquil stop in a high-energy city, this infrequently-visited modernist church is tucked away in plain sight in residential Polanco. Designed by famed architect Juan Sordo, it was completed in 1961 and features a sharp triangular structure covered in handmade yellow ceramic tiles. Show up during visiting hours and you can tour the grounds inside and out. Indoors, the Jesuit temple is encased by multi-colored stained glass windows that catch vibrant fractals on sunny days, with an effect almost like being trapped in a kaleidoscope. It's a place of worship and quiet contemplation, yes, but also a haven for architecture nerds.

La Rifa Chocolateria Arrow

Indigenous to Mexico, cacao has been consumed in the country and played an important role in Mesoamerican societies since 19th BCE; La Rifa continues the tradition with a small roaster on-site. There are a handful of tables sprinkled in the tree-shaded plaza out front, optimal perches for spending an hour or two. Ask to see their production in the back and they will most likely give a tour. The main event is sipping chocolates—water-based and closest to how cacao was consumed, pre-Columbian, before the introduction of the Spanish (and thus cows and milk). The front-of-house folks are happy to explain the finer nuances of their roasting process, flavor-profiles, and history of Mexican chocolate.

Ahuehuete Arrow

This six-seat collection room is a distillate library, a stunning space housed in a centuries-old building in one of Mexico City’s oldest neighborhood. The Porfirio Díaz-era bar and backbar were found in a Puebla antique store and are over 100 years old (once you book here , you'll be notified of the exact location) It'll cost you $75 per-person for a six-spirit sampling, light snacks, and water. Inside, there are only six seats and a knowledgable barkeep/tour guide crafting a rich journey for you and your fellow spirit geeks. While tequila and mezcal are some of Mexico's greatest exports, there are dozens of other plant-based spirits like bacanora, sotol, raicilla, and charanda, distilled in micro-batch quantities in rural communities that never make it into commerical circulation—nor are they intended to. The team behind Ahuehuete has been collecting bottles throughout the years, traveling to rural villages to find interesting batches for their private collection.

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Mexico City Travel Guide

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Location | Getting There | Where to Stay  |  Things to Do  |  Mexico City Tours  |  Travel Safety  | Mexico City Blogs |  FAQ

mexico city travel guide

Mexico city travel: at a glance.

Mexico City (aka CDMX or DF) is the fifth largest city on Earth, and North America’s biggest (and coolest ) city!

From hip neighborhoods  and Aztec history, to Xochimilco ‘s colorful boats, the amazing Teotihuacan UNESCO World Heritage Site, and of course, delicious tacos , there’s nowhere on Earth quite like Mexico City DF.

🤔 What is CDMX and DF?

You’ll often see Mexico City abbreviated as CDMX. This stands for Ciudad de Mexico en español, which means “Mexico City.”

You may also hear it called “DF,” which is short for  distrito federal , or federal district. 🗣 Note: DF is pronounced day-effay , not dee-eff.

Mexico City DF is about the equivalent of the “DC” in Washington DC. However, Mexico City is both a state and a district in Mexico, unlike Washington DC, which is only a U.S. district.

Mexico City Travel: Know before you go

• ✈️ Airport: Benito Juarez International Airport AKA Mexico City International (code: MEX)

⏰ Time Zone: Central Daylight Time (GMT-5)

• 💰 Currency: Mexican Peso
• 🗣 Language: Spanish, though English is common, and you may even hear some indigenous languages
• 🎫 Mexico Visa: The vast majority of travelers do not need a visa for Mexico — this includes Americans, Canadians, Japanese and most Europeans. Head here to see if you need a Mexico travel visa.
• 🔌 Electricity Socket : You’ll mostly find Type A (two-prong) and Type B (three-prong) — the same as used in the United States. For visitors from other countries, you’ll need this  universal travel adaptor .
• 📲 Mexico SIM Card : Wondering, Do I need a SIM card for Mexico? The answer is yes, every traveler will want a one for the reasons explained in this article all about the best Mexico SIM cards .
• 🚙 Car Rentals : The Mexico rental car process can be a bit daunting, and many people are apprehensive to drive in a foreign country. I get it! Check out this guide to Renting a Car in Mexico for info on the process.

What’s the best time to visit Mexico City?

With its temperate weather, Mexico City is a year-round destination. However, October to April are the ideal months for Mexico City travel because this is the dry season.

It can be cold during the winter nights (think 45°F or 7°C at night from December to February), so some prefer the rainy season of May to September because it’s much warmer.

Where is Mexico City located?

Mexico City is located in Central Mexico — in ( about ) the dead center of the country! It borders seven other states, and makes for a great home base to explore Central Mexico on all these great Mexico City day trips .

Mexico City Map

What state is Mexico City in?

Mexico City is actually its own state — one of the 32 states in Mexico . However, this was a somewhat recent change, and before it became its own state, it was a part of Estado de Mexico (Mexico State).

What’s the best way to get to Mexico City?

The Mexico City Airport is the largest airport in Mexico, and you can find direct flights to Mexico City from many places all over the world.

The easiest, safest and best way to get from Mexico City Airport to your hotel is via private shuttle service , but you can also catch a taxi or Uber, or take the Metro, bus or other public transportation.

🚕💨 Note: If you’re planning to take Uber, make sure you have a Mexico SIM Card so you can call one. Trust me on this, the free Mexico City Airport WiFi is always spotty, so you’ll need data to call your Uber.

Best neighborhoods in Mexico City

Wondering where to stay in Mexico City? The majority of visitors stick to the Roma and Condesa area, or Polanco and Reforma area. These are safe and central neighborhoods, close to many things to do in Mexico City !

The four areas highlighted below are where I recommend all travelers stay, but Coyoacan and Centro Historico (Downtown) are also good options.

Roma & Condesa

From beautiful architecture, pretty parks, walkability, cute cafes, street art, street tacos, and a chill vibe, Roma and Condesa are two of the best Mexico City neighborhoods. These sister neighborhoods are located next to one another. 

Colonia Roma (Rome Colony) consists of Roma Norte  (North Rome) and Roma Sur (South Rome); many prefer Roma Norte, though both are nice. You’ll sometimes see Condesa referred to by its official name,  La Condesa (The Countess).

Polanco & Reforma

While Roma and Condesa have a hip feel, Polanco and Reforma are all about luxury. In fact, Polanco is known as the most posh area in Mexico City, and its main street, Avenida Presidente Masaryk, is called the Rodeo Drive of Mexico City .

Reforma is the name of one of Mexico’s main streets, Avenida Reforma , but also the neighborhood’s name. In Reforma, you’re right next to Chapultepec Park , and surrounded by skyscrapers, upscale hotels, cool street art and more.

Best things to do in Mexico City

Besides all the mouth-watering  Mexico City tacos 🌮 you’re going to want to devour, there are also a good amount of Mexico City day trips just outside of the city to see the beautiful nature, UNESCO World Heritage Sites, colorful colonial cities, pueblos magicos (magic towns), and much more.

Discover some of the Mexico City highlights below ⤵

Xochimilco Boat Cruise

Teotihuacan Pyramids

Chapultepec Park & Castle

Mexico City Museums

Mexico City Day Trips

Lucha Libre Mexican Wrestling

Stroll Centro Historico

Eat ( way too many ) Tacos

Grutas de Tolantongo

Best mexico city tours.

Tours in Mexico City are a great way to see the sites and all the surrounding areas — and unless you’re planning to rent a car in Mexico City (I don’t recommend this!) , tours are the best way to get around because transportation costs can add up quickly.

Is Mexico City safe for tourists?

According to experts, you are statistically quite safe while visiting Mexico, including Mexico City. That’s not to say bad things don’t happen in Cancun Mexico City; they do.

As with all big cities, it has good and bad areas. If you stick to these  best neighborhoods in Mexico City , and avoid ones like Tepito and Doctores, you’ll likely be be safe in Mexico City.

Millions of Americans go to Mexico on vacation every year, so if we play the numbers game, the number of incidents is very small… When I’m asked if Mexico is a safe place to go travel on vacation, my response is  yes . —Carlos Barron, FBI Veteran (source:  Forbes )

As with traveling anywhere, you’ll also need to follow general travel safety measures, like not walking home alone at night and staying aware of yourself and surroundings. For an added safety measure, pack these  travel safety items , dress in a way so your Mexico City outfits blend in with the locals, and buy a Mexico SIM card .

Is Mexico City safe for solo travelers?

On a personal note, I lived in Mexico City by myself for one year, and felt quite safe. Now, this wasn’t magic; I made it a priority to stay safe by not walking home alone at night, never drinking too much, etc. Check out my Mexico City Solo Travel Guide for more info on Mexico travel safety for solo female travelers.

What’s the best travel insurance for Mexico?

This is a question I get a lot as a Mexico travel writer and Mexico expat. To determine which Mexico travel insurance is best for you , consider factors like the policy’s total cost, your deductible, the coverage you need, your medical benefits, etc.

🏆 In general, I only ever recommend three companies to purchase Mexico travel insurance from:

• World Nomads — For general travelers and adventure travelers.
• SafetyWing — For general travelers and digital nomads in Mexico.
• Travel Insurance Master — Mexico travel insurance search tool, for those who want to compare policies.
• 👉 Click on any of the links above to get a FREE quote on your policy!

Mexico City Blogs: Learn more about Mexico City travel 🇲🇽

Mexico City Day of the Dead Parade 2024: Ultimate Guide

Mexico City Day of the Dead 2024: Best Things to Do & More

Mexico City to Teotihuacan: 5 Best Ways to Get There in 2024

Mexico city travel: frequently asked questions, can you drink the water in mexico city.

No — Unfiltered Mexico tap water is not safe for human consumption. However, you will need to keep drinking water and to stay extra hydrated, as Mexico is quite close to the Equator. In fact, dehydration is one of the most common ways people get sick in Mexico. So what can you do?

• If you’re renting a Mexico City Airbnb or VRBO with a kitchen, you can boil the water before drinking it.
• You can keep buying bottled water — Though this gets expensive, and is horrible for the planet!
• Use the Water-To-Go Filterable Bottle . This refillable bottle not only keeps you hydrated, but also filters your water so you don’t get sick in Mexico, and is good for the planet ♻️ Get 15% OFF with code SOLO15!

The Water-To-Go Bottle has a built-in, three-stage filtration system that removes 99.9999% of all water-borne contaminants. These include bacteria, microplastics, viruses, heavy metals, chemicals and more. I personally own one, as you can drink Mexico water from any source (even the tap), and be completely safe.

Will I get altitude sickness in Mexico City?

Maybe — Altitude sickness is very random, and can happen to anyone who’s at a high elevation. In case you didn’t know, Mexico City is about 1.5 miles above sea level, a half-mile higher than Denver, Colorado, “The Mile High City.”

For this reason,  everyone  who’s traveling to Mexico City should come prepared. Check out this guide — Mexico City Altitude Sickness: How to Prevent & Treat It .

🧳 Mexico Packing list

Wondering what else you need on your packing list for Mexico? Check out this guide — Ultimate Packing List for Mexico + FREE Checklist Download !

What’s the Mexico City weather like?

Weather-wise, Mexico City has what is known as the Eternal Spring climate, meaning it’s never super hot or super cold — so you really can visit year-round. However, during the Mexico City rainy season from about April to September, it can rain quite a bit.

The best time for Mexico City travel is during the dry season, from about October to April . The summers are nice as well, just with a much higher chance of rain.

• The prettiest time of year in CDMX is from (approx.) February to early-April, when the bright purple jacaranda trees are in bloom!
• This also coincides with the Mexico butterfly migration at the Piedra Herrada Monarch Butterfly Sanctuary , located in the nearby town of Valle de Bravo . From about November to March, millions (maybe even billions ) of monarchs travel to Mexico from Canada.
• The city hosts the annual Parade of Alebrijes , the Día de Muertos (Day of the Dead) parade, and other festivities during the last week in October.

Is Mexico City worth visiting?

Yes — Mexico City CDMX is a unique Mexico destination that so many types of travelers will want to check out.

If you love big cities, you must visit Mexico City — the 5th largest city on Earth! For travelers who love culture, there are three UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Mexico City, and abut 150 Mexico City museums .

Foodies will also fall in love with Mexico City, famed for both its street food tacos and Michelin Star Mexico City restaurants alike.

How many days do I need in Mexico City?

Mexico City is one of the biggest cities in the world — and the largest city in both Mexico, and all of North America. Realistically, you could spend a whole year there, and never run out of incredible things to do in Mexico City ! For a first time trip, four full days seems to be a sweet spot.

As with all big cities, you’ll want to have a great itinerary in place to make the most of your trip. This 4 Day Mexico City Itinerary takes you neighborhood by neighborhood, so you don’t miss any of the best things to see in Mexico City.

🗣 Mexico Language

Mexico Fun Fact : There’s actually no official language of Mexico!

Spanish is the most widely-spoken, so some mistakenly say Spanish is the official language of Mexico. However, the government actually recognizes 68 national languages, including the Nahuatl Aztec language, and the Maya language.

💰 Mexico Currency

Mexican Peso — Exchange rates vary, but have hovered around $18-21 pesos to $1 USD for about the last decade. You will find some places that take U.S. dollars, but usually at an unfavorable rate, so stick to using pesos in Mexico .

☀️ Mexico Weather

Mexico is a big country — the 7th largest on Earth, in fact! It’s hard to generalize the weather in Mexico, because it will vary greatly by where you’re traveling.

In general, temperatures are mostly mild everywhere all year long, though summers on the coast are hot and humid, and winters in Central and Northern Mexico are on the colder side. Throughout the whole country, the rainy season runs from (about) April through September.

✈️ Mexico Busy Season & Slow Season

• Mexico Busy Season: The busy season in Mexico runs October to March, as this is the dry season and you’ll get the best weather. December is the busiest month for tourism in Mexico.

• Mexico Slow Season : If you don’t mind some rain, you’ll often find the best travel deal during the Mexico slow season of April to September. Do keep in mind that June 1-November 1 is Hurricane Season, and Mexico beaches are all susceptible.

• Mexico Shoulder Season : The shoulder season is that magical time when prices are still low and the weather is good. The Mexico shoulder season is from about mid-October to November and January to early-April.

🧳 Download your FREE Mexico Packing Checklist here!

Check out this Ultimate Packing List for Mexico — so you know what to pack and what NOT to pack for Mexico! This article offers advice on packing for Mexico cities, and packing for a Mexico beach vacation.

Beyond what Mexico outfits and clothing you’ll want to bring, here are a few extra things to consider:

• Filterable Water Bottle: Mexico is close to the Equator, so you’ll need to stay extra hydrated. In fact, dehydration is one of the most common ways people get sick in Mexico.

A filterable, refillable water bottle not only keeps you hydrated, but also filters your water so you don’t get sick in Mexico.

The Water-To-Go Bottle has a built-in, three-stage filtration system that removes 99.9999% of all water-borne contaminants. These include bacteria, microplastics, viruses, heavy metals and chemicals.

• Mexico SIM Card: Want to be able to use your phone in Mexico?! Of course you do! Pick up a TELCEL Mexico SIM card before your trip, and swap it out on the plane while you’re waiting to exit, so you have phone and data service the second you arrive in Mexico.

•  Anti-Hangover Meds: Planning to party hardy?! Make sure you’re not wasting any of your precious travel time with a hangover. Liquid I.V. has about 70,000 reviews on Amazon, and is considered the best defense against a hangover.

•  Sun Hat: No matter if you’re headed to the beach or a city, you’ll want to wear a hat to shield yourself from the strong Mexican sun. This cute sun hat is the perfect stylish and practical accessory for your Mexico vacation.

•   Sunscreen: As you’ll want to reapply a few times throughout the day, a light, Mineral-Based Sunscreen is ideal.

Headed to the beach? Do your part to practice responsible tourism in Mexico by only using an eco-friendly reef safe sunscreen while swimming. You can even ditch the sunscreen altogether and opt for a long sleeve swimsuit (AKA rash guard) instead.

•   Bug Repellent: Mosquitoes are common throughout Mexico — especially on the beaches! REPEL Insect Repellent is an eco-friendly brand that’s DEET-free and plant based, with a pleasant lemon and eucalyptus scent. Don’t want to use a spray? Pick up some Mosquito Repellent Bracelets .

The vast majority of travelers do not need a visa for Mexico — this includes Americans, Canadians, and most Europeans. Head here to see if you need a Mexico travel visa.

🤔 What is the mexico FMM ?

When you go through Customs & Immigration to enter the country, you’ll receive your Forma Migratoria Multiple , or FMM Tourist Card (sometimes listed as FMT). If you’re coming by plane or cruise ship, there is no charge; for those driving across the border, the FMM costs about $30USD.

In most circumstances, all visitors get a 180-day (six month) visa — so you can legally stay up to six months!

🚨 Have your FMM on you at all times

Keep in mind that though it’s called an FMM card , it’s actually just a small piece of paper. Keep your FMM on you at all times in your wallet, as this proves your legal status in Mexico. It’s rare, but if an officer stops you, they can ask to see your FMM.

🎫 Don’t lose your FMM!

You need to have your FMM on you at all times, as proof of your legal status in the country.

Be sure to keep track of your FMM, as you’ll have to give it back to an Immigration officer at the airport, cruise port, or land crossing when you’re leaving the country.

If you lose your FMM, there is a $600 peso ($30 USD) cost to replace it, and some paperwork you’ll need to fill out before you can leave the country.

If you’re flying home, plan to arrive at the airport about one hour earlier than you normally would to do the paperwork and pay the fine.

As this question doesn’t have a yes/no answer ( I wish it did! ), I do my best to answer it in depth in this article, Is Mexico Safe for Travelers Right Now ? However, for the most part, Mexico is actually statistically quite safe for all travelers — including solo travelers.

Check my Solo Female Mexico Travel page for more info.

💃 Mexico solo travel guides

Mexico is a big country, and it has plenty of amazing solo female travel destinations — like the ones featured in this article, Mexico Solo Travel: 20 Safe Destinations for Female Travelers .

In it, you’ll get recommendations of places to visit in Mexico, from solo travelers who have actually been to them.

🎧 solo travel podcasts

• Ep. 34 |  Planning your first Mexico solo trip • Ep. 40 | Tips for safe solo travel in Mexico • Ep. 53 | 30 Solo female travel tips, Pt. 1

To answer the question, Is it safe to drive in Mexico? — YES , it’s considered safe to rent a car and drive in Mexico.

As the country is quite large, road trips are a great way to see a lot in a little time, and especially popular in the Yucatan Peninsula and Baja California Peninsula.

The one caveat to Mexico driving safety is that you’ll be in a foreign country, unfamiliar with their laws and customs. Head here for a complete guide to Renting A Car in Mexico: Everything You Need to Know , where you’ll also get 10 useful Mexico driving tips!

🚙💨 Looking for the best Mexico car rental company? Discover Cars works with both local Mexican companies and international companies to get you the best rates. Not only do I recommend them — I also use them!

As a general rule, you’ll want to know at least a few words of Spanish when visiting anywhere in Mexico. This is both a sign of respect, and will also help you have a better, smoother trip.

If you stick to the more touristic places in Mexico, you should be fine with basic Spanish. For those planning to venture off the beaten path, be advised most people in pueblos  (small towns) speak little to no English.

🗣 Here are some options:

• Brush up on your Spanish: Use a language-learning program like Rocket Spanish , so you’re confident, and conversational, before your trip.
• Download the Google Translate App: For this to work at all times, you’ll need a Mexico SIM card with data — as the app won’t work when you’re off-WiFi.
• Travel with a Mexico phrasebook: This Lonely Planet Spanish Phrasebook is an Amazon best seller, and a great non-digital language assistant!
• Save this infographic an image on your phone. This way, you have access to these common words, phrases and questions, even when you’re off-WiFi.

• Work With Us

The Ultimate Mexico City Travel Guide (51 Best Things to Do and See)

Written by Becca

Updated on December 26th, 2023

Dreaming of how to explore Mexico City during your trip or long weekend? The best way to see Mexico City is through the famous sights and off the beaten path alternative experiences.

This article may contain affiliate links. We earn a small commissions when you purchase via those links — and it's free for you. It's only us (Becca & Dan) working on this website, so we value your support! Read our privacy policy and learn more about us .

Posted in Mexico

Things to Do in Mexico City

• Sinagoga Justo Sierra
• Mercado San Juan
• Mercado De Artesanías La Ciudadela
• Barrio Chino
• Cantina El Tio Pepe
• Alameda Central
• Palacio Bellas Artes
• SEARS (Finca Don Porfirio Cafe, to be specific)
• Zócalo (Plaza de la Constitución)

Metropolitan Cathedral (Catedral Metropolitana)

• Museo del Estanquillo
• Casa de los Azulejos
• Museo de Arte Popular
• Terraza Catedral
• Templo Mayor
• Calle Regina
• Frida Kahlo Museum (Casa Azul)
• Mercado de Coyoacán
• Cafe Avellaneda
• Mercado de Comida, Coyoacán
• Parroquia San Juan Bautista
• Parque Centenario & Jardín Centenario
• Cineteca Nacional
• Create Your Own Coffee shop Tour
• Mercado Roma
• Parque México
• Parque España
• Avenida Alvaro Obregón
• Avenida Ámsterdam
• Nevería Roxy
• Cafe Péndulo
• Bosque de Chapultepec
• Museo de Arte Moderno
• Museo Nacional de Antropologia
• Castillo de Chapultepec
• Jardín Botánico del Bosque de Chapultepec
• Museo Soumaya
• Avenida Horacio
• Antara Fashion Hall & Cinepolis VIP

Biblioteca Vasconcelos

• Mercado de Lagunilla
• Our favorite Mexico City Food Tour
• Lucha Libre
• Xochimilco Canal Boating
• Teotihuacán Ancient Pyramids
• Selina Hostel & Selina CoWork
• The Red Tree House
• Four Seasons Mexico City
• Hotel Condesa DF
• The Mexico City Metro

Introduction to what to do in Mexico City

Mexico City is undoubtedly overwhelming. You can choose to explore Mexico City with a food tour , by its bar scene and through its food and amazing tacos .

Luckily for travelers, the sights can be broken down into several main areas that can be explored on foot. Exploring Mexico City should include cultural and historic sites, present-day trendy (and safe) neighborhoods , museums and of course, FOOD!

Scattered throughout the neighborhoods are some very nice parks and plazas as well. We’ve noted which ones should not be missed and which have sights of their own inside of their boundaries.

For a long weekend or three-day trip, we recommend spending a full day walking in Condesa and Roma, followed by an afternoon in Coyoacán.

A second full day should be spent in Mexico City’s historic downtown area, getting your fill of the hustle and bustle, the history, cultural places of interest and seeing markets.

If you have a third full day, we recommend taking a day trip to Teotihuacán and/or doing a hot air balloon experience to see the pyramids from above.

So, how do I get up in a hot air balloon at Teotihuacan?

If you're not afraid of heights, grab a spot in a hot air balloon tour for an unforgettable sunrise.

If you have additional days or a week, you can take short trips to the surrounding pueblos like Tepoztlán, Puebla or Cholula. If you don’t want to leave the city, that’s no problem!

We’ve listed heaps of attractions in the main neighborhoods , and you can always opt for a food tour, walking tour or relaxing day to enjoy the cafe scene . Don’t forget to throw in a rooftop bar from our list when the weather is nice!

Get your walking shoes on and brush up on your Spanish , as Mexico City is a great city for any type of traveler!

Looking for new proven ways to save money on flights and airfare to Mexico? The easy solution is to sign up for Going , the leading way to find flight deals and mistake fares, directly to your inbox. Use HALFHALF20 to get 20% off!

Things to do in Mexico City’s Historic Center & Downtown

Sinagoga justo sierra.

Possibly one of the more surprise sights that we saw in our final days in Mexico City, the Sinagoga Justo Sierra is a beautifully-restored historic synagogue that was originally built in 1941. This was the original center of community for Mexico City’s Ashkenaz (Eastern European) Jewish immigrant population, and it was here that they celebrated Bar Mitzvot, weddings and other joyous occasions.

The synagogue was restored to its current splendor between 2008 and 2009. What’s interesting is that from the outside of the street, you’d never know there was a white building reminiscent of Israel behind the large wooden doors from the street. This was a great place to visit for an afternoon. Visiting hours close daily at 5 pm. Admission is free and donations are accepted.

Mercado San Juan

There are lots of “Mercados San Juan” in Mexico City, but the biggest one of all is in the heart of downtown Centro near Chinatown. Go here for everything produce-related and also for its gastronomic section, where you can order a ceviche from seafood vendors and have some sit-down service, or try some wines and cheeses in the Italian-themed vendors.

Mercado De Artesanías La Ciudadela

This market is where you go to pick up your huaraches, Day of the Dead-themed trinkets, beaded jewelry, woven clothing items, dolls, candles and anything that qualifies as a craft. Bargaining is welcome.

Barrio Chino

Mexico City’s Barrio Chino (Chinatown) has been minimized down to really only two or three city blocks. Don’t worry, though - you can get fortune ‘galletas’ (cookies), Chinese food at some of the eateries like Hong King and get ‘pan chino’ (bao) on the street for a few Pesos.

Cantina El Tio Pepe

Cantina El Tío Pepe is one of the bars we feature in our CDMX bar guide , but it’s more than a bar. It ironically nearly became like our neighborhood bar, even though we didn’t live in the ‘neighborhood’ (the neighborhood being Centro) until having been in CDMX for an entire month.

This historic cantina is no-frills and the waitstaff are friendly. They’ll tell you a bit of history about the place if you ask (in Spanish). Drinks are no-nonsense, and the menu comes in a dual-column spreadsheet type of format. Where else can you throw back a shot or a beer at a place that’s been in business since the 1870s?

Alameda Central

Alameda Central is a big city park with lots of criss-crossing walkways. There are street vendors everywhere, so if you want potato chips or a ‘sangria’ (sweet soda in a plastic cup with chili around the rim, garnished with a Mexican lemon slice), this is your place.

Go on weekends for some serious people-watching. It’s also rather safe in the early evenings past dark, but use caution.

Palacio Bellas Artes

We’ve seen the outside of Palacio Bellas Artes for sure (see below, “SEARS”), but we have a confession: we have not been inside Palacio Bellas Artes . We’ve heard great things, nonetheless. This is Mexico City’s gem of an art institution, and hosts cultural events like dance and opera. It is best known for its murals by Diego Rivera inside. Worth a visit!

SEARS (Finca Don Porfirio Cafe, to be specific)

If you want to get straight to the ninth-story view of Palacio Bellas Artes (it has a beautiful multi-colored roof) and you’re also craving a coffee, you’re in luck because you can enter SEARS and go to the cafe on the top floor. We featured this cafe in our cafes guide because we liked the view so much. Note: you can only enter if you get seated by a hostess, and then you do have to order something, even if it’s only a can of seltzer.

Zócalo (Plaza de la Constitución)

The Zócalo is one of the largest public squares on Earth. It’s surrounded on all sides by government buildings, the National Palace and the giant cathedral. You can reach the Zócalo by metro, to Zócalo station! Surrounding this area are lots of pedestrian-only streets lined with shopping and food vendors.

This cathedral is massive, and sits on the Zocalo square. Get this: the full name of it is “Catedral Metropolitana de la Asunción de la Santísima Virgen María a los cielos.” It’s pretty big, and pretty old, too. You can admire the architecture of the outside and the inside as well. Apparently you can climb to the roof, but we haven’t done this. If you get to do it, let us know!

Museo del Estanquillo

Museo del Estanquillo was a late addition to our CMDX repertoire, but guess what - the entrance is free and they have a rooftop with a bookshop and small cafe. Take the elevator up as high as you can and then turn right to walk up a flight of steps.

The result is a cool rooftop with the tops of old stone buildings in view. The museum itself deals a lot with the film history of Mexico, so that’s cool as well!

Casa de los Azulejos

This beautiful and historic building looks more like it would be in Lisbon than in Mexico City! Decorated in blue and white tiles, it’s one of our favorite places to take photos in CDMX . You can find it at Av Francisco I. Madero 4, in Centro.

Museo de Arte Popular

This art museum has a collection of exceedingly interesting Mexican heritage in the form of art from different regions. You can see Day of the Dead figurines and sculptures, unique alebrijes (Mexican folk sculptures) in a variety of sizes and media, cultural masks from different regions and eras and the excellent gift shop, which is an attraction of its own.

The building itself is an art deco relic from the earlier half of the twentieth century and was originally a firehouse. Inside, there is tons of natural light and an open center where you can look up at all the floors. We highly recommend that art enthusiasts not miss this one.

Terraza Catedral

Terraza Catedral is more a portion of our Mexico City Bar Guide than not, but we’re including it on sights to see. That’s because the view from this rooftop bar (which we brand as “non-pretentious,” by the way, as it’s on top of a hostel) is quite a sight to see, especially at sunset!

Templo Mayor

The Templo Mayor historical site is another place we didn’t actually go to, but we’ve walked by it, having been frequent visitors to the Zocalo area. The Templo Mayor archaeological site is a place you can visit to see what lies below Mexico City in terms of ancient ruins and structures. Sounds fascinating!

Calle Regina

Also a late addition to our go-to list, Calle Regina starts near Bolivar and ends a few blocks later to the east. It’s a pedestrian street, where first you’ll hit the Regina church and its cafe, and then you’ll see Cafe Regina on your left.

Sit down here for an americano - they’re GOOD! Continue on Calle Regina as long as you like, and you’ll see street art (some of it political, but some of it sappy and colorful) and sit-down restaurants and bars with sidewalk seating.

Sights to see in Coyoacán

Coyoacan is a cool neighborhood to Mexico City’s southwest. While you may choose to get there by Uber or by metro, consider that it’s not exactly a stone’s throw from Centro or Condesa. You’ll need a dab bit of time to get there.

Frida Kahlo Museum (Casa Azul)

The Frida Kahlo Museum , also known as Casa Azul (Blue House), is where Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera lived and worked. In this museum, you can learn all about Frida’s life, as the main focus is on her. You can see her early works, learn about her family history, see her clothes and her medical apparatuses.

The house itself is nice to visit because the exhibits revolve around a leafy courtyard. This museum can be a bit controversial for Mexicans, who note that the hefty entrance fee (more than $12 USD) makes it so that most Mexicans cannot afford to visit. The museum is privately-run, and you’ll notice some corporate sponsors like Bank of America, Samsung and Vogue on some signage. We strongly suggest getting tickets in advance (you have to pick a time and date to visit).

Mercado de Coyoacán

The Mercado de Coyoacán is pretty big, but not big enough to get lost in. The main food here is the tostada, a dry toasted corn tortilla that you eat flat with toppings on top.

You can choose from any of the types of toppings that you see in big pots - chicken, mushrooms, beef, seafood and more. They don’t break the bank, either, but watch out - they are filling!

Cafe Avellaneda

Cafe Avellaneda was one of Mexico City’s first third-wave cafes, and it’s always busy. There aren’t all too many seats inside, but if you wait, you can get a seat at the coffee bar and watch the masters do their craft.

The menu is fun, too - you can get coffee cocktails (non-alcoholic) like the one Becca tried, which had espresso, tonic water, juniper and tamarind!

Mercado de Comida, Coyoacán

The choices at this food market (think: food in terms of lunch, not grocery shopping) are overwhelming, but thankfully, the place isn’t too big overall. We had quesadillas (did you know that in Mexico City, a quesadilla does not necessarily need to have cheese? Mind blown!) and tamales.

You can also order fresh juices. Prices are set, so you won’t get ripped off if you don’t speak Spanish! You can also have pozole at the stands in the center of the market. Cash only!

Parroquia San Juan Bautista

You can’t really figure out how big this Catholic church is until you walk inside (it’s free to enter). Located in the heart of the Coyoacán neighborhood, the church and its ex-convent are worth a peek.

Parque Centenario & Jardín Centenario

This park and garden in Coyoacán’s commercial center are great for people-watching and passing through. You’ll see that the fountain has coyotes in the center, and that’s because Coyoacán means “place of the coyotes.”

Cineteca Nacional

A local friend took us to Cineteca Nacional , not to see a movie, but instead to marvel at this architecturally-worthy cinema. What we also liked about the complex was that in addition to a movie theater, it has a bookstore, a cafe and a lawn where people hang out in the sun.

What to see and do in Condesa & Roma

Condesa and Roma are great neighborhoods in the heart of Mexico City where most travelers tend to stay.

Create Your Own Coffee shop Tour

You’re in Condesa and Roma, so you obviously have to see all the cafe culture in these two neighborhoods of Mexico City! Start with our coffee shop guide to CDMX and star these cafes in your maps so that when you pass by, you can say that Becca and Dan from Half Half Travel sent you!

Mercado Roma

Mercado Roma is something to see as well as something to do (the doing is the eating), and at Mercado Roma, which is also featured in our Mexico City Nightlife Guide , you can try cuisine from many parts of Mexico, and pizza as well. Mercado Roma is a place to be during the day, and also at night on weekends when the kiosks are open late.

Parque México

Parque México is the larger of the two main Condesa parks, and it’s several blocks long. We love it for its variety - there’s a children’s playground, some quiet paths, a lot of great greenery and lots of people with cute dogs.

Parque España

Parque España is the smaller of the two Condesa parks, and here, you’ll find nice trees and paths, some man-made ponds and lots of kids and dog-walkers. We usually cross through Parque España when walking toward other parts of the neighborhood.

Avenida Alvaro Obregón

Avenida Alvaro Obregón is a commercial strip that we didn’t truly discover until it was nearly time to leave our stint in Roma Norte. What a shame! It took a distant cousin of Becca’s who was visiting to get us out on Alvaro Obregón. This is where you’ll find bars, restaurants and cafes all lined up next to each other, and the side streets are nice as well. One of our favorite spots in this area is Quentin Cafe .

Avenida Ámsterdam

It’s easy to obsess over Avenida Ámsterdam. Home to classic art deco architecture, old buildings next to new ones, some historic mansions, and a leafy middle path (great for running and dog-walking!), Avenida Ámsterdam runs in a circle around Parque Mexico and believe it or not, used to be a horse-racing track back in the day.

Nevería Roxy

More of a place to experience Mexican old-school culture and less of a sight, Nevería Roxy is an absolute classic for ice cream treats. This feels like a time warp! They have a great selection of sorbets that come in the flavors of Mexican fruits. The place is cash-only.

Cafe Péndulo

We listed Cafe Péndulo in our list of Mexico City cafes , but it’s a thing to do in its own right. Cafe Péndulo is a beautiful bookstore (and has more locations than this Condesa one). You can browse literature in Spanish, and some in English, and look at their cool section of funny knick-knacks to buy as gifts (much like the “stuff” section in Urban Outfitters).

Bosque de Chapultepec

Bosque de Chapultepec is a giant park in the center of Mexico City. It separates Roma and Condesa from Polanco, which is located on its north side.

Bosque de Chapultepec is a city park that is massive, and has it all - the city’s museums, botanical gardens, amusement parks, lakes with boats for rent, quiet groves where couples set out picnics, statues with poetry, running paths and even a “quiet section” where people go for some peace and there’s no talking allowed. You can find history, wildlife and some fresh air (it seems), and you can spend hours in the whole place, especially in some of our favorite parts, the pedestrian avenues lined with vendors selling stuffed animals, face-painting, snacks, fried food and other Mexican goodies.

Museo de Arte Moderno

We went to the Museo de Arte Moderno (Museum of Modern Art) on a Sunday, when it was free. The museum has four major wings, all themed a bit differently. This is where you can see the original (we asked) of Frida Kahlo’s ‘Las Dos Fridas,’ one of her most famous works.

It’s also where we saw the most about Diego Rivera we had seen so far in all of Mexico City (note: you can go many other places to learn about Diego Rivera, but we didn’t get to them).

Museo Nacional de Antropologia

This is a museum we never actually got to go to, but we’ve heard it is pretty interesting. It’s not free, but the entrance fee isn’t too hefty, either. Located inside Bosque de Chapultepec, this is somewhere good to stop if you have a rainy day, or if you’re passing by. You can learn all about the history of the Mexican people through anthropology.

Castillo de Chapultepec

Would you believe that we never made it to Castillo de Chapultepec (Chapultepec Castle)?

Mexicans call this their version of a castle, with the disclaimer that, “It’s not like castles in Germany, but it’s our version of a castle.” If you go, let us know! It’s located in Bosque de Chapultepec with a lot of signage leading to it.

Jardín Botánico del Bosque de Chapultepec

This is probably our favorite aspect of the entire Bosque (“forest,” in Spanish). The Jardín Botánico is free to enter, and serene once you’re in there. We entered from the more populated parts of the park, and our first stop was the succulents garden.

We also liked the vegetable garden, the cactus garden, the banana tree grove and the “Garden of the Future,” which was created by local artists entirely of recycled plastic items.

What to do in Polanco, Mexico City

Museo soumaya.

Museo Soumaya was our major destination the day we went (in truth, we walked three miles from Roma Norte) to the upscale Polanco neighborhood.

Museo Soumaya is unique because on the outside, its exterior is composed of thousands of hexagonal aluminum pieces, and it’s quite a sight to see. Inside, it’s likely not what you’d expect (we were surprised), as you’ll find ancient Chinese and Japanese ivory sculpture, turn-of-the-century French art and an entire floor of sculptures from centuries past in an open floor plan with natural light.

On the first floor are some noteworthy Diego Rivera murals and mosaics. There’s also a Botero sculpture housed in the Museo Soumaya - can you find it?

Avenida Horacio

Avenida Horacio is one of the main thoroughfares of Polanco, and what’s so nice about it is that it’s like a boulevard with a leafy walkway in the middle. You can walk through Polanco nearly uninterrupted by traffic and admire all the plant life and sporadic vendors throughout your walk.

Antara Fashion Hall & Cinepolis VIP

Want to transport yourself into the modern and new-wave shopping malls of Mexico City? Antara Fashion Hall is an upscale mall, where you’ll find Western brands, a large grocery store, several bars and restaurants that cater to the Western style and probably our favorite aspect of this mall, Cinepolis VIP, where we saw Spiderman on Christmas Day. If you’re in Mexico City and you want to see a movie, this was a very comfortable experience!

Sights North of Zócalo and Centro Histórico

This biblioteca , or library, is one of the most beautiful in Mexico City. Entrance is free, and it’s usually open til 7:30 pm on most days. Go for its photographic qualities - its six floors of boxy metal cubic design will have you looking up and up. Take the steps (or elevator) to the top floor, and then get the dizzying view down!

This library is one of our top ideas for the best places to take photos in Mexico City , among some other great spots in the region.

Mercado de Lagunilla

We’re not sure where we heard about Mercado de Lagunilla , but we are sure glad we went.

We walked toward Lagunilla, a very local neighborhood where we saw no other foreigners nor tourists, and made it all the way to the Mercado de Tela, where we entered right before closing hours to see rows of quinceañera dresses, custom suit shops, decorations for parties and wedding dresses. Outside the fabric market, in the market itself, we found street food, toys, dolls, shoes, clothes and you name it.

Given that this is not a typical tourist attraction of any sort, we recommend taking a responsible level of safety precaution in order to keep your bag and pockets safe. Check out our Mexico City safety guide to see exactly what we mean.

Entertainment and tours in Mexico City

Our favorite mexico city food tour.

If you’re a foodie, we suggest taking a Mexico City food tour with Eat Like a Local. After our month and a half in Mexico City, we still learned some new things by going to the markets with our awesome local guide, Rocio. We visited markets we had never stepped foot in, and ate foods we had never tasted. Above all, our guide made us feel safe and informed. We also had so much fun!

Lucha Libre

Lucha Libre is a dramatic and exciting version of wrestling-meets-entertainment and it is a true Mexican tradition. Lucha Libre (meaning ‘free fight’ in Spanish) takes place in an arena with the fighters in a ring, in a series of rounds, starting with female fighters, then some one-on-one fighting and finally lots of teams-taking-on-each-other fighting.

The performance is theatrical and the aim is to rev up the audience, but the fighting is also very physical and in fact, very dangerous. You have to give these guys credit for doing what they do! Lucha Libre takes place most nights of the week and tickets are not expensive and are in the range of 200 pesos each ($10 USD). You can buy tickets on Ticketmaster.

Attractions outside Mexico City and beyond

Xochimilco canal boating.

If you want to have a day with a group floating on a multi-colored boat down the canals of Xochimilco , take an Uber out to this region of Mexico City and hop on a boat for a morning or afternoon.

You will float through the canals and you can buy your own food and drink to bring, or buy things from vendors who pass in boats. You can buy micheladas, pulque, tamales and more, and you can pay mariachi bands to play a song for your group! Many people consider this one of the best day trips from Mexico City , even though it’s technically in the Federal District.

How's everyone getting to Xochimilco?

Xochimilco is like a day trip within CDMX, so going with a group is great! Plus, see Frida Kahlo's house in Coyoacan.

Teotihuacán Ancient Pyramids

These ancient Mexican pyramids were built by civilizations way before the Aztecs had control of the region, and you can visit them for a day trip. Beware that LOTS of tourists come here, and weekdays will be less crowded than Saturday and Sundays. Want to see them from above? We went with Sky Balloons Mexico for a very early morning hot air ballooning experience and it was awesome.

What's the best way to see Teotihuacan?

As Teotihuacan is a bit far, going with a guide in the early morning is a great choice!

Our Mexico City Yoga Recommendations

OV Yoga is a boutique yoga studio located on Avenida Amsterdam in Condesa. Classes run several times a day and with several different teachers.

You can drop in, or reserve in advance. Note: prices differ for payments on cash and credit, and classes with the studio’s founder cost slightly more than with other teachers.

Greenyoga operates in several different locations in Mexico City and the teachers are great.

Becca tried the Roma-Juarez location! Note: the studio itself is up two flights of dizzying spiral staircase steps, so if you have a fear of open staircases, choose a different studio. Downstairs near reception, there is a tiny cafe with healthy and gluten-free snacks. You can rent mats.

Walk-ins are fine, but be sure to check the schedule because the classes are specified by level, so it’s best to choose which suits your skill level.

Where to Stay in Mexico City

Selina hostel & selina cowork.

Selina Mexico City Downtown is a new hostel-hotel in a vintage and iconic Mexico City hotel, formerly Hotel Virreyes. This massive property was converted into the backpacker and digital nomad accommodation in early 2018. There’s WiFi throughout the property, two different communal kitchens (one is specifically for apartment guests), and rooms come in a variety of dorm bed options, privates and studio apartments.

In addition, Selina Mexico City has a coworking space. You can book a hot desk for a day, week or month, and there’s even a private outdoor patio for CoWork members to use!

The Red Tree House

The Red Tree House is a beautiful boutique hotel full of character in Condesa, right off Avenida Amsterdam. Rooms are all built off of a central courtyard that makes you feel like you left the city. You’ll be surrounded by greenery, tables with umbrellas and angular staircases painted yellow, red and orange.

The lobby and common areas for guests are like being home in a mansion, with a fireplace (great for winter chilly nights), dining area for the morning breakfast hours and lots of books to read.

Casa Decu is a boutique hotel located several steps away from The Red Tree House, but with a very different vibe. Casa Decu is an art deco building transformed into an Instagrammable art-deco-meets-modern haven for the trendy traveler.

If you’re into roof decks, you’ll love hanging out on the sunny rooftop, which has places to sit and have a coffee.

Four Seasons Mexico City

The Four Seasons Mexico City is top-notch, with an interesting location right near Bosque Chapultepec and Avenida Paseo de la Reforma, a major road. It is sandwiched between Cuauhtémoc and Roma, making everything pretty accessible.

The Four Seasons is unique because it has a leafy courtyard where the restaurant is located, and at night it feels a bit like an urban jungle. If you look up, you can see lit-up neon skyscrapers nearby. Even if you don’t stay at the Four Seasons, we recommend having a drink at Fifty Mils , the hotel bar.

Hotel Condesa DF

We love the location of Hotel Condesa DF , and based on their fabulous rooftop bar, we can only expect that the rest of the hotel is just as wonderful.

Hotel Condesa DF is located across from Parque España in the neighborhood of Condesa, with loads of cafes, restaurants and bars nearby. Hotel Condesa is chic yet defined, and classy yet not pretentious. It seems like a good bet for a trendy traveler who wants good access to lots in the neighborhood.

How to get around Mexico City

There are so many ways to get around a massive metropolis like CDMX. Let’s look at a few of the easiest ways to get around with transport.

We heard from some Mexicans that Uber changed Mexico City. With the start of Uber in CDMX, locals started going out at night more, because getting a cab home would be safe and affordable.

We took Uber during our first month in Mexico City (that is, when we didn’t feel like walking!) and Uber Pool as well (gotta stay green!). All the drivers were really nice and most were very friendly, too.

The Mexico City Metro

If a metro system can’t scare you, then try out the Mexico City metro .

There are lots of fun facts about it. For example, did you know that each station has a pictograph symbol? You’ll see a guitar and scarf to symbolize mariachi bands for the Garibaldi stop, a cricket for Chapultepec (the Spanish word “chapulín” came from the Nahuatl word chapultepec, meaning cricket) and two doctors for the neighborhood stop in Doctores.

Each ride costs 5 Pesos, which is approximately $0.25. For each ticket, you can go an unlimited amount of stops as long as you stay within the system by transferring and not leaving the paid area. To get a ticket, you can enter at any entrance of any stop and head to the Taquilla (ticket booth), where you slide your bill or change through a window and receive your change and a paper ticket. Paper tickets get fed right-side up into the turnstiles, and then you’ll be in!

Read signs carefully to ensure that you’re going in the correct direction for your destinations, and watch your pockets!

While we did not experience any crime in the Mexico City metro, it’s true that at rush hour, it’s more difficult to see who has access to your pockets and your bag when you’re crammed in a crowded train car.

The metro runs until midnight most days of the week, but we don’t suggest taking it much after 10 pm for safety reasons. During daytime, there’s no problem.

The Mexican Peso: What to know and expect

The currency in Mexico is the Mexican Peso. In any given year, the exchange rate might be between 17 and 22 Pesos to a US Dollar. For something that costs 20 Pesos, it’ll be about $1.15 USD.

You’ll find that most street tacos cost between 10 and 15 Pesos, while tacos in restaurants (depending how nice the place is and which type of meat you are ordering) will be priced at 20-70 Pesos.

A bottle of water usually costs 10 Pesos. A beer at a dive bar will be around 35 to 55 Pesos, and at a fancier bar, upwards of 80-90 Pesos.

Can you bargain in Mexico City? You can bargain sometimes on items that do not have a set price. We’ve tried bargaining for some things, and haven’t won. Other times, buying a second of something and asking for 10 Pesos off as a discount works (mostly with artisan vendors who have their goods laid down on a tarp on the street).

Denominations of bills come starting at 500 Pesos, and this is what you’ll get when you withdraw from an ATM. From there, there are 200-Peso bills, 100-Peso bills, 50-Peso bills and 20-Peso bills.

For amounts less than 20 (approximately 1 USD), there are 10-Peso coins, 5-Peso coins, 2-Peso coins, 1-Peso coins and 50-cent-Peso coins. We didn’t see any that were smaller than a 50-cent coin, and we mostly only received them as change in markets.

Safety in Mexico City

In the 45 days we spent in Mexico City, we did not experience any crime. Given, we carry backpacks and purses with zippers, we don’t travel with too many flashy electronics unless we’re taking photos with our cameras and we don’t hang out in dangerous areas!

Still, we’ve developed some helpful habits from spending more than four months in Latin America, for both our second times. We detail all of that in our guide that answers the question, “ Is Mexico City Safe for Travel ?”

Here are a few basic tips

• Never leave your phone on the table when sitting at an outside cafe.
• Never let your bag out of your sight at a restaurant.
• Avoid drinking tap water in Mexico City (order bottled water when dining out).
• Don’t forget about altitude sickness, and take altitude medication from home if you’ve experienced altitude sickness when traveling in the past.

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25 Mexico City Travel Tips for a First-Time Visitor: Local’s Guide

If you are planning to visit Mexico City for the first time, the Mexico City travel tips contained in this post will help you stay safe and make the most of your vacation.  

You are in good hands here because I have been living in Mexico for the last two years, have travelled the country extensively, and have spent a significant amount of time exploring all the different districts of Mexico City (CDMX).

I understand that Mexico is a place that a lot of people are nervous about travelling to for the first time (I definitely was when I first arrived here). So I have compiled a comprehensive list of Mexico City travel tips that I wish I had had when I first visited. 

Table of Contents

25 Mexico City Travel Tips for a First-Time Visitor 

Spend time exploring the city’s different neighbourhoods .

Mexico City’s various neighbourhoods (“barrios”) are one of the major draws of travelling here. Each one is like a different village in itself, and each one has its own distinctive personality and charm. 

Roma Norte, Roma Sur and Condesa are popular choices among the Digital Nomad and expat crowds and are known for their eclectic boutique stores, quirky coffee shops, craft breweries and colourful street art. Nearby Polanco is an upscale district that could be likened to being Mexico City’s answer to Beverly Hills or New York’s 5th avenue. 

Yet while being home to many luxurious malls and designer stores, Polanco manages to be elegant without being pretentious. There are also lots of great coffee and lunch spots here, with leafy views of Chapultepec Park. 

Coyoacan, while a little out of the way, is another great district that is too frequently overlooked. Coyoacan is to Mexico City what Greenwich Village is to New York. 

Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul is by far the most famous attraction in this area. However, once you arrive and start meandering around Coyoacan’s leafy streets, you will quickly find that the artist’s former home is the tip of the iceberg of what Coyoacan, with its European-style outdoor cafes and independent art galleries, has to offer. 

Know which areas to avoid

One key distinctive difference in exploring Mexico City and other Mexican/Latin American cities is that you have to be mindful of where you are walking and which districts you are venturing into. You cannot mindlessly follow Google Maps as you might on say, a sleepy Greek island. 

The Mexico City districts outlined above are generally very safe. The city centre and the area around Palacio de Bellas Artes are mostly safe, but as you may expect in a very crowded area that is popular with tourists, it is definitely somewhere where you need to watch your bags, as pickpockets do operate in this area.

Mexico City is a place where you can be in one area which is completely safe, and then walk a couple of blocks further down the road and find yourself in a sketchy district where you don’t want to be. 

The Plaza Garibaldi district in the centre is known for its live mariachi performances but it is certainly a little rough around the edges. Absent-mindedly walk a couple of blocks further and you can end up in Tepito, a dangerous market area that is known as a place where criminal groups go to purchase basically anything they need, and fake/stolen goods are sold. 

Iztapalapa, Ciudad Neza, Doctores and La Merced Market are other areas that are best avoided. However, these regions are a little further out of town so it is not the case that you could accidentally wander into them. 

Think carefully about where you want to stay 

Choosing where to stay in Mexico City is an important decision as the location where you base yourself can really impact your trip. You might think that staying as central as possible is the best choice, but the area around the Zocalo and the Palacio de Bellas Artes can be sketchy at night and you likely won’t feel comfortable walking back after going out for dinner. 

Roma Norte and Sur, Condesa, Anzures and Polanco are great areas for first-time travellers. Coyoacan is great if you want something a little quieter and you want to hang out in a creative district loved by artists and writers. 

However, Coyoacan is a bit of a trek from the centre of town and Mexico City traffic is often horrendous, especially at peak times, so you might find it annoying to be spending so much of your trip in transit and stuck in lines of traffic. 

Check which airport you are flying into 

There are now two airports in Mexico City after the Mexican capital’s second airport “Felipe Ángeles International” (NLU) opened in March 2022 to handle the significant overcrowding experienced by the principal airport. Most international and domestic flights generally still fly to the main Mexico City airport (MEX). 

However, it is important to check the airport code when you book your flights so that you can see exactly where you will be arriving. NLU is almost 40km north of Mexico City, while MEX is 16km east. 

If you have a couple of flight options available, scour through them and try and fly into MEX where possible. It will significantly cut down your travel time and overland expenses getting into the city centre. 

Dress appropriately for a Mexican city 

Do check the weather before planning your trip to Mexico City so that you can plan your Mexican packing list accordingly. A lot of people assume that Mexico = constant heat, humidity and sunshine but that is not true of all of Mexico. 

There are so many different climates and geographies encompassed in this vast country and Mexico City is at a much higher altitude than coastal destinations like Cancun, Tulum and Puerto Vallarta so it is generally much cooler. 

During the spring and summer months, it seldom gets hotter than around 77°F-82.4°F (25°C-28°C) here. Temperatures drop in the Fall and in the winter, you are looking at daily averages of around 15°C/59°F so you absolutely need to layer up like an onion and wear a coat at this time. 

I often see online travel guides state that women should wear jeans, not wear skirts, or dress a certain way in Mexican cities and honestly, you should dress however you please and feel comfortable. (Within reason). 

Mexico City is a wonderfully diverse city made up of residents from every race and background from all over the globe. You should feel free to embrace your individual style and sense of expression here. 

That said, I would say that people don’t generally wear flip-flops or beach-style sandals here, even when it is super hot. (Partly due to hygiene concerns in the city, etc). So if you do so, you might find you draw attention to yourself as a tourist. 

Make the most of Mexico City’s museums 

There are tons of great museums in Mexico City and in fact, Mexico City is actually believed to be the city with the most museums in the world. (It is a close competition between Mexico City and London, UK and nobody is 100% certain which snags the title). 

It is believed that there are around 170 museums and over 40 galleries in Mexico. That’s enough to keep you occupied for almost a year! 

It can be overwhelming to know which ones to prioritise and choose but there are a few places that stand out. Even if you don’t consider yourself a “museum person”, you should stop by the National Museum of Anthropology.

This is the most visited museum in Mexico (for good reason) and contains extensive exhibition halls that showcase artefacts belonging to various ancient civilisations that have been excavated from across Mexico. If you enjoy art (or you just want to learn more about Mexican artists and culture), check out the MUAC (University Museum of Contemporary Art) , Museo Tamayo and the Palacio de Bellas Artes. 

Check which days Mexico City’s museums are free

Many Mexico City museums are constantly free to enter (such as the Soumaya Museum and Museo Jumex). 

Others are free on certain days of the week. It is worth checking when and where you can get free admission so that you can plan your itinerary accordingly – especially if you are hoping to stick to a budget. 

This article shares several Mexico City museums which are permanently free. Check the websites of the specific museums that interest you to see which days of the week they are free. 

Many museums offer free entry for children under a certain age and are often free for Mexican nationals on Sundays. 

You cannot drink the tap water

You cannot drink the tap water in Mexico City or anywhere else in Mexico for that matter. Although it is purified at the source, it gets contaminated with bacteria, dirt and other bugs en route to your tap so it isn’t safe to drink.

(Even Mexicans don’t drink it). Drinks and ice in bars and restaurants are always perfectly safe to consume because they are prepared with mineral water and businesses get ice delivered. 

Most hotels will give you 2 complimentary bottles of water for each day of your stay. You can also purchase mineral water from any convenience store or kiosk. 

Book your visit to the Frida Kahlo Museum in advance 

Some Mexico City tourist attractions are so popular that you absolutely need to reserve your place to visit in advance and Frida Kahlo’s house is one of them. Tickets to Casa Azul, the home of the late Mexican icon, often sell out a day in advance and there is always a snaked queue down the street to get inside. 

Book your ticket and timeslot online in advance and then show up 15-20 minutes before your time. If you just rock up at the museum without a ticket reservation, you will be turned away. 

It is honestly a good idea to reserve most tours, museums and attractions in advance here, especially if you are travelling in spring and summer. 

Read up on the earthquake risk 

A scary reality of travelling to Mexico City is acknowledging that the city is in an area with a lot of seismic activity. CDMX was built on an ancient lake bed so the ground here is not the most stable. 

Not to mention, Mexico as a whole is located in a subduction zone where the Cocos oceanic plate and the North American continental plate meet. Don’t terrify yourself worrying about earthquakes but it pays to read up on what to do in the event of one. 

An earthquake could essentially rock Mexico City at any time. On April 3rd 2023, a mild 5.3 magnitude quake rocked the city , and a major earthquake caused many fatalities and injuries in 2017. 

Make time to take day trips out from Mexico City 

Mexico City is such a wonderful, culturally rich city with so much to do and see that you could easily spend weeks here and still feel like you haven’t gotten enough time. And with so much to offer, it can be hard to tear yourself away and see other parts of Mexico if you only have a limited amount of time in the country. 

However, since there are literally dozens of wonderful day trips that you can take from Mexico City to archaeological sites, pueblo magicos , hiking trails and cute towns and villages that you can reach in an hour or two, it would be a shame to confine yourself to just one place. 

Some great suggestions are as per the below. 

• Teotihuacan – An impressive Aztec city known for its grand pyramids
• Xochimilco canals – Take a gondola ride through the canal network while drinking beers and listening to music
• Puebla de Zaragoza – Cultured capital of the state of Puebla
• Cholula – Puebla state pueblo magico home to the world’s largest pyramid
• La Isla de la Muñecas – Creepy island within the Xochimilco canals where a local man decorated the trees with hundreds of dolls to supposedly appease a child ghost
• Tepotzotlán – Pueblo magico known for its handicraft markets and baroque churches 

Carefully plan out your itinerary 

There is so much to see and do in Mexico’s capital that even if you plan a 4-5 day Mexico City itinerary , you won’t be able to fit it all in. Nobody likes to over-plan to the extent that they have a rigid schedule that doesn’t allow them any flexibility or time to relax.

However, it is a good idea to roughly draft out what you want to see and do each day so that you make the most of your time and don’t spend too much time stuck in traffic, going back and forth across town, etc.

Suggested first-time Mexico City itinerary

A suggested (super condensed) four-day itinerary for CMDX is as follows:

• Day one: Have breakfast in Polanco, explore Chapultepec, visit the Anthropology Museum, dinner in an acclaimed CDMX restaurant  
• Day two: Spend the morning visiting Teotihuacan, explore central CDMX, visit Palacio de Belles Artes, stop by Museo Mural Diego Riviera, walk down Av. 5 de Mayo and see the Casa de Los Azulejos. Experience Mexico City by night
• Day three: Spend a day in Coyoacan and visit Frida Kahlo’s house
• Day four: Take a gondola ride at the Xochomlico canals and spend your afternoon admiring the street art and the quirky cafes of Roma and Condesa

Don’t hesitate to use the metro 

A lot of people seem to be afraid of using the metro in Mexico City and assume that it is dangerous. While you definitely need to watch your belongings and be aware of pickpockets, the same could be said of riding the metro in London, Paris, or anywhere else in the world. 

Taking the metro can save you a fair amount of money too. (Ubers are affordable here but if you are taking Ubers multiple times a day, it quickly adds up). 

Pick up a Mexico City Metro card 

Pick up a metro card from a kiosk at any station and top it up with 50-100 pesos or so initially. With a CDMX metro card, you will be able to ride across town for just 5 pesos a journey. 

Avoid the metro at rush hour

The Mexico City metro is the second largest metro network in the Americas (second only to New York) and is used by millions of people every day. While you may not always be able to get a seat, it is usually not overly crowded except at rush hour.

Rush hour is anywhere from around 8 am until 9.30 am, and from around 4 pm until 7 pm. When people are on their daily commute (like in any city), people are often crammed in carriages like sardines at this time. 

Use Uber to get around safely 

Uber and other domestic Mexican ridesharing apps like Didi and Indrive are the most popular ways for Mexicans to get around. In Mexico City, Uber is considered safer than using street cabs which might come as a surprise. 

However, with the app, you can see a driver’s past references, rating and driver and vehicle information which you simply cannot see if you hail random taxis. Since scams and even “express kidnappings” (where a tourist is held at knifepoint and forced to hold over valuables) are problems in Mexico, you should always use Uber here and never jump into a random taxi. 

Spend an afternoon in Chapultepec Park 

Chapultepec Park is a gorgeous leafy green space in the heart of Mexico City that offers a welcome respite from the concrete jungle. Chapultepec is actually twice the size of New York Central Park and it is so full of attractions and activities, that you really could dedicate an entire day to exploring it. 

The Museum of Anthropology should be your first stop. Sometimes, you will catch “Danza de los Voladores” performers in the little plaza just outside it. 

Browse through the street stalls selling all manner of snacks, artisanal goods and bric-a-brac, walk along the length of Chapultepec Lake, and stop by the 18th-century Chapultepec castle. This is the only castle in North America to have housed royalty.

Mexican Emperor Maximilian I and Empress Carlota lived here from 1864 until Maximilian’s death three years later. You should buy tickets to the palace online in advance to save waiting if you can. 

Try to spend at least five days in town if you can 

4 or 5 days is a good amount of time for a first visit to Mexico City. You will still have an ultra-jam-packed schedule, but it is enough time to experience the different neighbourhoods, the key museums, and a couple of the highly-rated restaurants that the city has to offer. 

If you dedicate only 2-3 days to Mexico City, you will be rushing around too much and you will find that you have to chop things out of your schedule. If you can spend a week in Mexico City, you can also do a couple of day trips to the villages and archaeological sites nearby. 

Use your common sense safety-wise 

When I visited Mexico City for the first time, even my Mexican friends in the Yucatan were a little concerned about it because historically, the city hasn’t been considered the safest place in the world. Mexico City can be safe , even for solo female travellers, provided you use your common sense. 

Choose to stay in one of the areas recommended above, never walk alone at night (take an Uber instead), be mindful of which areas you are walking into, purchase a theft-proof backpack/money belt, and be aware of your surroundings. 

A lot of this is common sense wherever you go. When you arrive in Mexico City, you might be surprised by just how comfortable you feel here. 

Be mindful of your budget 

Mexico is not necessarily as cheap as people seem to assume. This is particularly true of Mexico City and in tourist destinations like Cancun, Tulum and Playa Del Carmen. 

You should expect to pay between 100 and 250 pesos for a meal out in neighbourhoods like Coyoacan, Roma and Condesa.

In chic cocktail bars and rooftop bars, a cocktail can cost well over 100 pesos too. For a mid-range budget, you can easily find an Airbnb in Condesa or Coyoacan for less than $50 USD a night, while more upscale hotel rooms and suites close to Chapultepec and Polanco tend to start from around $100 USD. 

You can definitely find dorm beds in centrally-located hostels for as little as $10-$15 a night, and you can save a lot of money if you choose to cook for yourself, eat street food, or seek out cocina economicas. Just don’t assume Mexico is Southeast Asia-level dirt cheap because you will be in for a surprise. 

The admission prices for most museums tend to be between $5 and $15 but of course, many are also free. 

Don’t be afraid to experiment with street food 

People often associate street food with getting sick and being a victim of Montezuma’s revenge but that isnt always the case. (I have been living in Mexico for 2 years and have only been sick twice, and I already have IBS and stomach problems). 

Frankly, if you don’t experiment with the street food in Mexico, you are missing out on a huge part of the experience. Just use your common sense when choosing a tiangui or market to eat from. 

Choose places where there are lots of locals dining or waiting to be served and never eat anywhere where the food looks like it has been left out a while. Some of the best places to sample street food eats in Mexico City are: 

• Mercado La Merced – Mexico City’s largest market, which dates back to 1936 
• Mercado de San Juan – Great for exotic types of meat, burgers and steaks
• Medellin Market – Flavors from Colombia and wider Latin America
• Sullivan market – great for tacos, pambazo bread and antojitos

Consider taking an organised tour to get your bearings 

Taking an organised tour is a great way to get your bearings in any new city and the same rings true of Mexico City – especially if you are nervous about exploring Mexico. Better still, exploring with a local means that you have a Mexico City “expert” on hand to help you find places you never would have discovered independently. 

A number of local companies offer free (tip-based) walking tours. This free tour runs every day of the week and leads tourists to non-touristy parts of the city. 

You can also find a lot of great tour options via Viator and Get Your Guide. 

Enjoy Mexico City’s social scene 

If you are travelling to Mexico City solo like I did (or even if you aren’t and you just want to meet new people), you will be pleased to hear that it is very easy to meet fellow travellers, expats and locals. 

There are a lot of Facebook groups which are very active and where you can simply create a post introducing yourself, and see who wants to hang out/grab coffee, etc. 

Many often organise events and a lot of these groups also have their own Whatsapp chats where you can make plans with other people with similar interests. 

Some good ones to add to your radar are summarised below:

• Foreigners in Mexico City
• Foreigners & Expats in Mexico City (CDMX)
• Foodies in Mexico City (CMDX)
• Women in CDMX (Mexico City)
• Hiking in Mexico City 

Managing your money in Mexico 

It is always a good idea to exchange a small amount of money for Mexican pesos before your trip. 

However, rather than carrying wads of cash, just take a couple of hundred dollars worth or so and then withdraw more at an ATM when you arrive. 

It is a good idea to open a borderless bank account with Revolut, Charles Schwab or Wise. That way, you will not be charged foreign conversion fees.

You may need to pick up a Mexican SIM card 

If you have a US or Canadian phone plan, it may include calls and data coverage for Mexico so do check before you travel. However, if you are travelling to Mexico from further afield (UK, Europe, etc), it pays to pick up a Mexican sim card so that you can stay connected. 

Not all bars, restaurants, etc have free wifi here. While it is nice to disconnect when you travel, don’t underestimate how useful it is to be able to check directions on a map, search recommendations, etc. 

There are a couple of different network providers in Mexico but I would recommend Telcel. You can pick up a sim card from any Oxxo convenience store and you are looking at around 200 pesos for a 30-day “paquetes amigos” plan with unlimited social media use, texts and calls, and a generous amount of data

Final thoughts on these Mexico City travel tips

I hope that you find these Mexico City travel tips useful! I have been living in Merida in the Yucatan for the last couple of years and after travelling to 13 Mexican states and dozens of cities, Mexico City is one of my favourite places in the country by a mile. 

After your trip, I am sure that it will be one of yours too. Stay safe and have a wonderful time in Mexico!

If you need anything, please do not hesitate to reach out to me! Buen Viaje! Melissa xo 

Melissa Douglas

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Your Trip to Mexico City: The Complete Guide

Mexico City is a huge and vibrant megalopolis with a fascinating history dating back to the time of the Aztecs. As one of the world's largest cities by population,   Mexico City can be intimidating, but it’s a vibrant, engaging place with an abundance of attractions and services for travelers of all types. This Mexico City travel guide will give you an introduction to the multi-faceted destination and has the information you need to plan your stay.

Planning Your Trip

Best Time to Visit: If you can, plan your trip for the springtime, specifically late March or early April. At this time of year, the weather is warm during the day and cool at night, and the jacarandas are in bloom throughout the city. Language: Spanish is the main language spoken but there are several indigenous languages spoken in Mexico City (mainly Nahuatl, but also Mixteco, Otomí, Mazateco, and others). Many people who work in the tourism industry speak English, but the general population does not, so learn some Spanish phrases before you go! Currency: The Mexican peso (MXN) is the currency. The symbol is the same as a dollar sign ($), so be sure what currency prices are listed in (it will usually be pesos, but occasionally services offered to tourists are listed in US dollars ). Getting Around: A great way to explore Mexico City is by taking the Turibus , a hop-on-hop-off, double-decker, open-air sightseeing bus with stops at several of the city's main sights. However, the most economical way to get around is with public transportation. The Mexico City metro is large but fairly easy to navigate. When taking taxis, it's best to take authorized taxis or ask your hotel to call one for you. Alternatively, get an Uber. Travel Tip: On Mondays, most museums ( but not all! ) are closed, as is the first section of Chapultepec Park , so plan alternative activities if you’re in town on a Monday. Some ideas: go shopping, visit churches, go to Tlatelolco archaeological site (which doesn't have a museum), or visit the floating gardens in Xochimilco .

Things to Do

There is something for everyone in Mexico City. You can learn about the country's history, enjoy art in public spaces and museums, sample delicious food, shop until you drop, or enjoy a fun night out on the town. Art lovers, foodies, history buffs, and museum geeks will all be over the moon. As the site of the first Olympic games in Latin America and in a Spanish-speaking country,   sports history fans will be plenty entertained and even nature lovers will find something of interest (start by checking out the botanical garden on the UNAM campus )!

There is much more to do in Mexico City than you will have time for, so when planning your itinerary, do your research and prioritize. Be sure to leave plenty of time for getting from one place to the other—and for meals! Here are a few activities to get you started:

• Visit the Historic Center of Mexico City on foot, making stops at the Templo Mayor archaeological site which was the main temple of the Aztecs, the Metropolitan Cathedral which is Latin America’s largest and oldest cathedral, and the Palacio Nacional to see murals by Diego Rivera. The Historic Center is one of four UNESCO World Heritage sites in the city along with Xochimilco, the house of Luis Barragán, and the Central University City Campus.  
• Visit the National Anthropology Museum to learn about Mexico’s rich history and current ethnographic makeup.
• Go to the luchas ! Spend a fun evening watching a lucha libre wrestling show.

Explore more attractions with our full-length articles on the top Mexico City sights , the best free things to do and Mexico City day trips . 

What to Eat and Drink

Mexico City is the country's cultural and geographical hub, and you'll find a wide variety of specialties from all over the country, as well as international options. From street side taco stands to gourmet restaurants like Pujol and Quintonil (which are considered among the world's top 50 restaurants), and everything in between, you're bound to eat well here. If street food intrigues you but you find it intimidating, take a street food tour to get an introduction so you’ll know what to order when you venture out on your own.

As for drinks, you can try some of the traditional beverages made with agave , mezcal and pulque (not to mention tequila), or check out one of the city's stylish cocktail bars for the latest mixology creations. Some of the most iconic places to grab a drink include Bar La Opera (which has bullet holes in the ceiling from the time of the Mexican Revolution), and Miralto bar on the 40th floor of the Torre Latinoamericana overlooking the Palacio de Bellas Artes.

Explore our articles on the top dishes to try in Mexico City , the city’s best dining experiences , and the best bars .

Where to Stay

There are endless options for accommodations in Mexico City including Airbnbs, boutique stays, and luxury hotels. Decent economical options abound in the historical center and Colonia Tabacalera (near the Revolution Monument). Stay at Hotel Zocalo Central or Downtown Mexico for a home base in the center of town with nice views. If you’d rather be a bit further away from the hustle and bustle, check out boutique hotels in La Condesa and Roma neighborhoods such as Red Tree House or La Valise. If you’re looking for luxury, you can enjoy an upscale stay at the St. Regis or the Four Seasons on Paseo de la Reforma, or Las Alcobas in swanky Polanco district. Explore the different neighborhoods you can stay in, and our recommendations for the best boutique hotels.

Getting There

You will most likely fly in to the Benito Juarez International Airport (MEX) or perhaps Toluca (TLC). If you’re arriving over land from a different destination in Mexico, your point of arrival will probably be one of Mexico City's four major bus stations which are situtated in four corners of the city. From your arrival point, take an authorized taxi or Uber to your accommodation ⁠— although hailing a cab on the street is not as risky as it used to be, it's better to play it safe. Driving in Mexico City is not recommended for first time visitors as it’s not an easy city to find your way around and traffic tends to be congested.

Culture and Customs

There are a few cultural differences and customs that you should be aware of in Mexico City. In general, Mexicans tend to be more formal than people from the United States and Canada. Even though you're on vacation, it's a good idea to dress somewhat conservatively—Mexicans rarely wear shorts or tank tops in the city, so if you don't want to stand out too much, try to dress like the locals. It’s important to greet people before asking a question with a buenos días (good morning), buenas tardes (good afternoon), or buenas noches (good evening), depending on the time of day. Also, keep in mind that por favor (please) and gracias (thank you) are words that you cannot over use.

Mexican mealtimes may be on a different schedule than what you're used to, with the main meal of the day taken in the afternoon between 2 and 4 p.m. In restaurants, the server will not bring you the bill until you request it. Ask for “ la cuenta, por favor, ” or make a sign of writing in the air. Check your bill to make sure, but usually the tip is not included, and you should add 10 to 20 percent tip depending on the level of service. Tipping is customary in bars and restaurants, but not so much in food stalls and markets (though always appreciated). It's also customary to tip bellhops and cleaning staff at your hotel.

Money-Saving Tips

Mexico City is a truly affordable city and offers outstanding value at all price points. It's an excellent vacation destination for anyone on a budget. Of course each traveler will have to decide for themselves what's worth a splurge and where they want to cut back, but there are a few simple ways to maximize savings during your stay:

• Follow the Mexican mealtime schedule: have a big breakfast, which is generally the least costly meal of the day, then hold out until 2 or 4 p.m. for another large meal—you can find restaurants serving a multi-course " comida corrida " fixed price meal, and then if you're hungry at night, grab some tacos.
• Get around using public transportation. The Mexico City metro only costs a few pesos and is fairly easy to figure out. Consider it part of the adventure!
• Don’t buy overpriced drinking water and snacks at your hotel or tourist sites. Hopefully your hotel offers purified drinking water so you can refill your own bottle, but if not, make sure you buy your water, drinks and snacks at a corner store to carry with you or to have at your hotel during the night.

Learn more about the cheapest ways to have fun by exploring these free things to do in Mexico City and consider some budget travel tips.

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. " World Urbanization Prospects 2018: Highlights." Page 17. 2019.

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Mexico City

Don’t be intimidated by Mexico City’s size. It’s easy to find a corner of CDMX—formerly known as the Distrito Federal—for you, and one visit is rarely enough. Visitors quickly fall under the city’s spell: the music, the people, the street food and murals, and the thrilling juxtaposition of grand European-style boulevards, ultramodern architecture, and ancient Aztec sites. As journalist David Lida asserts: “Mexico City is the capital of the 21st century.” Give in to its siren song.

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Palacio De Bellas Artes

Photo by Ramiro Reyna Jr/Shutterstock

When’s the best time to go to Mexico City?

Weather-wise, it’s almost always a good time to visit Mexico City. Because of the altitude (7,382 feet), temperatures remain fairly stable throughout the year, averaging in the mid-50s to low 70s. (Bring a light jacket and scarf and you’ll be fine.) But our favorite time to visit is between Christmas and Epiphany (January 6), because while almost everything’s open, the pollution and traffic are mellower because of the business holidays. Another great time to come is in the days around September 6 for the Independence Day festivities.

How to get around Mexico City

Mexico City’s Benito Juárez International Airport (MEX) is the primary point of arrival and departure for international flights. Taxis into the city center are affordable and take only about 20–30 minutes, depending on traffic.

Mexico City is massive, which can be overwhelming even to experienced visitors. AFAR’s partner, Context Travels offers visitors a private, historian- or architect-led introduction to downtown Mexico City from its roots as a center of government and ritual in the Aztec Empire to its commercial and cultural modern present.

Once in town, you can get around easily on the Metro, Metrobus, taxis, Uber, and the city’s bike-share program, Ecobici. The Metro and the Metrobus are extensive and very inexpensive. Taxis are a good option, to, but stick to the official pink cabs when hailing from the street. Uber is very affordable in CDMX and the app makes it easy for non-Spanish speakers to get around.

Can’t miss things to do in Mexico City

- Two pilgrimage sites for art- and design-minded tourists—architect Luis Barragán’s House and Studio and Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul —require tickets and often are sold out. Secure your tickets before you leave home. - Cinco de Mayo is not a big deal in Mexico. If you’re looking for a party, come for Mexican Independence Day (September 16), Day of the Dead (November 1), or the Gay Pride parade in late June instead. (The annual December 12 feast day of the Virgin of Guadalupe is more somber, but still pretty epic in scope.) - Try and catch a Luche Libre match at Arena Mexico . You’ll get ridiculously fun entertainment, as well as recognize many of the same motifs you’ve seen in the city’s churches and cultural sites—good and evil, vivid primary colors, capes, and masks.

Food and drink to try in Mexico City

• Local lunchtime is around 3 p.m., and dinner after 8.
• Tip bartenders and restaurant servers 20% of the bill. You can get away with 15%, but live large and do your part for the economy.
• Reservations for most of the big-name restaurants are available on apps like OpenTable and Resy. Book ahead and don’t wait until you get to town to get a table.
• As in seemingly every other modern city, there are craft beer and artisanal cocktail scenes in CDMX. Jardín Chapultepec , a chill beer garden hidden between industrial buildings at the edge of the Condesa neighborhood, offers impressive examples of Mexican craft beers, as well as food stalls and picnic tables. Licorería Limantour , in Roma Norte, is our favorite destination for cocktails. The elegant Art Deco-inspired space is slightly less packed on weeknights so you can give your meticulously crafted drink the attention it demands.

Culture in Mexico City

There’s no better place to witness Mexico City’s sometimes confusing clash of culture than at the Zócalo . Here, in the main square of the city, you can relish centuries of history, grandiose architecture, and exceptional people-watching. The whole tension of the city’s past, present, and future is here, with the cathedral revealing the Catholic and colonial history and the Templo Mayor , right next door, practically throbbing with the violent Aztec past. The square is a swirl of activity with noisy street performers, vendors, local teenagers, and traffic all fighting for your attention.

Local travel tips for Mexico City

• Cantinas will always serve snacks (called botanas ) with your drinks.
• This is not a city where you wear shorts.
• Protests happen from time to time and are annoying and occasionally paralyzing (at least when it comes to traffic), but as long as they’re peaceful, police are not allowed to intervene.

Guide Editor

Julie Schwietert Collazo

Two Sisters Abroad

two sisters exploring the world

4 Days in Mexico City: Epic Itinerary and Travel Guide

Mexico City is a unique place. Not only is it huge, being the largest city in North America, but it’s also packed full of history, amazing restaurants and tons of fun things to do. While you could easily live in Mexico City for months and never run out of things to do, for a first trip, I recommend 4-5 days. This is enough time to get a feel for the city and experience many of the wonderful attractions, restaurants and historical sites that it has to offer. Let’s get right into your 4 day Mexico City itinerary and travel guide. 

Note: these days are packed pretty full of activities! 4 days is a good amount of time for a first trip to CDMX, but because there’s so much to do and see, this itinerary is pretty busy. The good news is, it’s totally customizable, so it’s easy to take things out if you want more low-key days, or if you decide you want to spend more time at any of the stops!

Where to Stay in Mexico City

There are many great neighborhoods to stay in when visiting Mexico City. My favorite is definitely Roma Norte, followed closely by Coyoacan, Polanco and Condesa. The Historic Center, Centro Historico, while fun to visit, isn’t necessarily where I’d recommend basing yourself. This is just my personal preference, but I found the other neighborhoods to be nicer and quieter with just as much to do and even better restaurants and cafes. 

Hotels in Mexico City:  

• NaNa Vida CDMX – Roma Norte 
• ULIV Colima – Roma Norte
• Brick Hotel Mexico City – Roma Norte
• W Mexico City – Polanco 
• Pug Seal Allan Poe – Polanco
• Casa Tuna – Coyoacán
• H21 Hospedaje Boutique – Coyoacán 

Hostels in Mexico City   

• Casa Pepe – Historic Center 
• Viajero CDMX Centro Hostel – Historic Center
• Casa Pancha – Condesa 

Itinerary for 4 Days in Mexico City

Note: This day involves quite a bit of walking. Instead of walking between stops, Ubers and DiDis (ride share app) are available and inexpensive. Just be aware that with traffic you may spend the same amount of time in a car that you would walking between destinations. 

On your first day in Mexico City I recommend exploring the Centro Historico and Zocalo. Hop in an Uber or DiDi and get ready for a fun morning. 

Enjoy Breakfast at a Delicious Cafe 

Start your day at Cafe Regina for a delicious coffee and breakfast. This cafe is located on a pedestrian only street and is a wonderful place to grab a quick meal. From Cafe Regina, you’re close to many of the major attractions in the Centro Historico. 

Note: Farmacia Internacional is another amazing place to grab coffee or breakfast, and it’s very close to the next stop on the day’s itinerary – just 6 minutes walking to Mercado de la Ciudadela. 

Wander Through Mercado de la Ciudadela

From Cafe Regina, walk 15 minutes to Mercado de la Ciudadela. On the way, Mercado San Juan is also worth a quick walk through. 

This is my favorite market in Mexico City! In Mercado de la Ciudadela, you’ll find tons of artisan items, handicrafts, jewelry and other souvenirs. I found this market to be much less crowded than other markets in the area, and most of the vendors were so kind. Mercado de la Ciudadela is also a great place for photography. It’s colorful, bright and a fun place to snap some photos. I recommend going early, right when it opens at 10am. 

Visit the Palacio de Bellas Artes 

From Mercado de la Ciudadela take a 15 minute walk to the beautiful Palacio de Bellas Artes. This cultural center is absolutely stunning and, in my opinion, one of the most beautiful buildings in Mexico City.  

Take in the Views from the the 8th Floor of Sears 

If you want even more beautiful views of the Palacio de Bellas Artes, head across the street to Sears Department Store. Head to the 8th floor and you’ll find the Finca Don Porfirio coffee shop with absolutely breathtaking views of the Palacio de Bellas Artes. 

 Finca Don Porfirio opens at 11am, and I recommend being there as close to opening as possible to avoid a long wait. The coffee at Finca Don Porfirio is pretty good and it is 100% worth it for the views. 

OPTIONAL: Pasteleria Ideal and Mirador Torre Latino 

If you’re still hungry, or have room for a little snack, walk over to Pasteleria Ideal – just 5 minutes from Sears. This famous pastry shop is known for their incredible variety of inexpensive pastries. It’s fun to walk through and pick up a few sweet treats. 

After securing your treats, head over to the Mirador Torre Latino, but only if it’s a clear day. If it’s cloudy, you won’t have good views. There is often a line for Mirador Torre Latino, so I’ve added this as an optional stop. It’s 160 Pesos per person to enter, so it’s definitely affordable. If you enjoy viewpoints, and it’s a nice day, then this is probably worth the stop. 

Check out the House of Tiles (Casa de los Azulejos )

From Sears or Mirador Torre Latino, take the one minute walk to the beautiful 18th century House of Tiles. This beautiful building reminds me so much of Portugal, and it’s a great place to snap some photos. The interior of the building is equally beautiful, and is home to a Sanborns restaurant. While the food at Sanborns, a chain restaurant, isn’t necessarily fantastic, the ambiance is lovely and it’s a beautiful place to have a drink and appetizer. 

Shop along Francisco I. Madero Avenue

After visiting the House of Tiles, you’re just one street away from Francisco I. Madero Avenue, a pedestrian-only shopping street that will take you right to the Zócalo, Mexico City’s main square. The Zócalo has roots and visible ruins that date back to the Aztecs!

Check out the Beautiful Mexico City Metropolitan Cathedral

This Cathedral is one of the focal points of the Zocalo. The cathedral is truly beautiful inside and out and it’s definitely worth a visit. It’s free to enter, but you can leave donations or purchase candles to light. 

Explore the Templo Mayor Museum

This museum is fascinating. Located just behind the Mexico City Metropolitan Cathedral, the Templo Mayor Museum showcases archeological finds and ruins from the Aztec civilization. The museum is just 90 pesos to enter and free entry is available for children, students and  teachers. If you don’t have time to visit the entire museum, there is a terrace area that is free to visit. From the terrace, you can view some of the ruins, and they are so interesting to see. 

Grab a Drink at a Rooftop Bar 

After exploring the Historic Center of Mexico City, start your evening with a drink on a rooftop bar overlooking the Zocalo. 

A great option is on the roof of Librería Porrúa, a bookstore in the Centro Historico. On the roof of the bookstore you’ll find a casual rooftop bar with beautiful views, as well as the El Mayor restaurant. The bar is a great place to enjoy a drink and watch the sunset. 

In addition to the bar on the rooftop of Librería Porrúa, Terazza Catederal (located on the 6th floor of Hostel Mundo Joven)  is another great rooftop bar to check out with views of the Zocalo. 

Have Dinner at Cafe de Tacuba

Cafe de Tacuba is one of the oldest restaurants in Mexico City, opening its doors in 1912. Just a quick walk from the Zocalo, it’s right in the hustle and bustle of the Centro Historico. The restaurant is a former convent, and to honor the building’s history, the waitresses are dressed as nuns. The decor in Cafe de Tacuba is truly beautiful, with its colonial architecture, art and stained glass windows. To make it even better, in the evenings a mariachi band plays. Overall, it’s a wonderful place to have dinner. 

They have a wide selection of traditional Mexican dishes on their menu, including numerous vegetarian options. 

End Your Day with Churros at Churreria el Moro

A trip to Mexico City certainly isn’t complete without visiting Churreria el Moro – a favorite since 1935. The original Churreria el Moro is still open today, just a 10 minute walk from Cafe de Tacuba, in the Historic Center. 

There will likely be a line for these delicious churros, but it’s definitely worth the wait. I recommend eating in, instead of doing take out, so you can admire the beautiful interior. The blue and white tiles and design are a beautiful piece of history.  Be sure to also get some hot chocolate to dip the delicious churros in – it’s the best combination. 

Start your Day at a Cafe in Roma Norte  

There are tons of great coffee shops in the Roma Norte area. Pick any of them to start off your day and enjoy a coffee and some breakfast. There are so many great cafes to choose from, but a few of my favorites include: 

• An adorable, old world style cafe. This is a great place to have a relaxing breakfast before a full day of exploring. Cafe Nin opens at 7am. 
• A bookstore with an indoor/outdoor cafe and multiple locations. They don’t open until 10am, but it’s a great place to have brunch. 
• A beautiful, elegant cafe with both indoor and outdoor seating. The ambiance is relaxing and they have a wonderful menu. They serve a variety of beautiful coffee drinks. 
• This bakery has become TikTok famous, so there will likely be a line for their delicious pastries. If you don’t want to wait for a table, there’s also a take out line. Whether you eat in or takeaway, be sure to try their guava roll pastry! 
• With three locations in the Roma area, Qūentin Café serves delicious coffee and pastries. This is a great stop for a quick coffee and breakfast before a day of exploring. 

Note: if you prefer to go on a guided bus tour that includes most of the day’s activities as well as transportation, check out the below options. Just keep in mind that they are large bus tours that offer limited flexibility. 

• Xochimilco, Coyoacán and Frida Kahlo Museum Tour
• Xochimilco & Coyoacán Private Tour
• Xochimilco, Coyoacán and Frida Kahlo Museum Private Tour

Take a Ride on a Trajinera in Xochimilco 

Taking a trajinera boat ride in the Xochimilco neighborhood is one of the most iconic things to do in Mexico City. These colorful, rowed boats (gondola style), are taken through a system of canals. While on the trajineras, you can purchase food, drinks and souviners from other floating boats (how cool right??) You can even hire a mariachi band to perform and they’ll come (literally jump) onto your boat to play a few songs. 

Important things to know about the Trajineras:

The trajineras are open from 9am-6pm daily. I recommend going in the morning, on a weekday if possible, as the trajineras get very, very busy and you can get stuck in boat traffic. 

Trajineras are BYOB (you can also bring snacks), which is a great way to save money. If you don’t want to pack snacks, no problem, you can purchase tons of items from vendors in boats along the canals. 

Each trajinera can fit up to 20 people, so grab some friends and split the cost! 

You can rent a trajinera for as long as you’d like, but a great amount of time is 1.5 hours (this is also, often, the minimum). In 1.5 hours you can have a lot of fun, but still save time for other sightseeing and other activities during the rest of the day. 

From downtown Mexico City (Roma Norte, Centro Historico, etc), an Uber ride will be anywhere from 1 hour to 1 hour and 45 minutes each way. Ubers will likely cost anywhere from $10-$14 each way.

How to get to Xochimilco

While you can Uber to Xochimilco and find a trajinera on your own, this can be stressful. To start, there is very limited cell service in Xochimilco, therefore calling an Uber can be difficult. Second, unless you speak Spanish, or are great at bargaining, you will likely pay way more than the standard $600 peso per hour rate. 

While it is more expensive, I recommend a guided tour – especially if you’re in a smaller group. This will make the experience less stressful and easier to navigate. The downsides to tours, however, is that they are less flexible with timing and more expensive. Additionally, many tour providers combine the trajineras in Xochimilco with other activities, like visiting Coyoacan. This can be good for some travelers, but others prefer to explore Coyoacan on their own. In the end, it is all up to your personal preference as a traveler and how you prefer to spend the day.

Xochimilco Tours:

• Includes transportation and pick-up in Mexico City! 
• Includes transportation to Xochimilco, but not back to CDMX. 
• Xochimilco and Mexican Fiesta

Head to the Coyoacán Neighborhood

Coyoacan is about 55-60 minutes from Xochimilco. You’ll spend the rest of the day exploring this area. 

Visit the Frida Kahlo Museum 

Make sure you book timed tickets in advance for the Frida Kahlo Museum , spots fill up quickly. This is one of the most popular museums in Mexico City. La Casa Azul (The Blue House, aka the Frida Kahlo Museum) is located just a few minute’s walk from the center of Coyoacan. 

La Casa Azul was Frida Kahlo’s home, where she was born, grew up, lived with her husband Diego Rivera, and later, died. Now, the house is a museum dedicated to her art and incredible life.  

Wander Through Mercado Coyoacán (Coyoacán Market)

Not far from La Casa Azul, Mercado Coyocan is a local market that features souvenirs, artisan items, fresh produce and local food. It’s a fun market to walk through and do some shopping, grab a quick snack, or just enjoy the atmosphere. 

Visit the Artisan Market in Jardin Allende Park 

Directly across the street from Mercado Coyoacan, you’ll find Jardin Allende park. On the weekends, this park turns into an art market, where local artists sell their work. This was one of my favorite stops in Coyoacan. You’ll find beautiful art and it’s a great experience to be able to talk with the artists about their work.

Relax in Jardin Centenario 

After a full day of activities, a short rest in Jardin Centenario, Coyoacan’s main square, is needed. Admire the beautiful Parroquia San Juan Bautista (Catholic Church), the Coyote Fountain, the colorful COYOACAN letters, and the beautiful Alcaldía Coyoacán (town hall). 

This town center is so beautiful and there is always a ton going on. Surrounding the town square there are also a great variety of shops, restaurants and cafes to pop into. 

Have Dinner in Coyoacán or Juarez 

If you’d like to stay in Coyoacan for dinner, there are some great restaurants to check out. 

La Coyoacana is a fun pick with mariachi music and an outdoor courtyard. TIP: if you choose La Coyoacana make sure you get a seat in the courtyard, the ambiance is much more fun and lively, and the decor is more beautiful. On the menu you’ll find a variety of traditional Mexican dishes with a few vegetarian options. 

One thing to note about La Coyoacana, although the overall experience was good, the service is pretty poor. Don’t let that stop you from dining there, just don’t expect excellent (or even very good) service. They don’t take reservations, so there may be a wait for a table.

Other restaurants to check out in Coyoacan: 

• Los Danzantes
• Corazon de Maguey

Elly’s Restaurant in Juarez 

If you’re willing to take an Uber to Juarez, 30-40 minutes from Coyoacan, Elly’s restaurant is one of my favorites in Mexico City. Although a little far from Coyoacan, if you’re staying in or near the Roma Norte neighborhood, this restaurant isn’t too far away (10-15 minutes by Uber.)

Elly’s restaurant feels like somewhere you’d find in NYC (in a good way). Interestingly, they describe themselves as “Elly’s es dónde la Ciudad de México y Nueva York se encuentran” – Elly’s is where Mexico City and New York City meet. 

Their menu is unique and delicious (including a fun variety of cocktails!) and the Mediterranean inspired dishes were some of the best food I had in Mexico City. The restaurant itself is beautifully decorated, very chic and modern, and, overall, it’s a fantastic place to have a meal. If you can, I recommend making reservations in advance. 

Take a Half-Day Trip to Teotihuacan

Located about an hour (30 miles) outside of Mexico City, Teotihuacan is an impressive pre-Hispanic archeology site dating back thousands of years. Interestingly, it is still unknown who the original inhabitants of this impressive city were. It is known, however, that Teotihuacan was one of the largest and most important cities in the Americas during its peak. 

Teotihuacan is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the pyramids, ruins and plazas are incredibly impressive. Among the most notable sites, you’ll find the Pyramid of the Sun, connected to the Pyramid of the Moon via the impressive Avenue of the Dead. 

To visit Teotihuacan you have a couple options : 

The first is to go on your own in an Uber (or on the bus if you’re close to the bus station.) An Uber/DiDi to Teotihuacan should cost around $20-35 USD each way. 

Once you’ve arrived, there will be tons of tour guides who approach you offering their services. Some will offer to show you just around Teotihuacan, and others will offer services to other ruins and local tequila tasting spots. If you don’t want a guided tour, simply walk to the entrance and pay 80 pesos to enter. From there, you can walk around and read the signs to learn about the interesting history of the city.

If you choose to hire a tour guide on site, expect to pay around $50 USD for a 1-2 hour long tour. You will  likely need to negotiate these prices, but with a tour guide you really do learn more about the ancient city and its history. 

One important thing to note is that  the cell service at Teotihuacan isn’t great, so it can be a little difficult to call/meet up with your Uber for the ride back. 

Option 2: Go on a Guided Tour with Transportation  

This option is more expensive, and offers less flexibility, but it is less stressful. There are a plethora of tours to choose from that include different stops and activities. 

Teotihuacan Tour Options:

• Teotihuacan: Private Tour From Mexico City
• Teotihuacan Express Private Tour from Mexico City
• Teotihuacan, Tlatelolco, Guadalupe Shrine and Tequila Tasting Tour
• I wasn’t able to do this on my last trip, but it is item #1 on my list next time I’m in CDMX.  
• This option doesn’t include a guided tour of Teotihuacan, but is instead a view of the archeological site from the hot air balloon. 

Eat Lunch at La Gruta  

If you decide to visit Teotihuacan on your own, or if you have free time on your guided tour, head over to La Gruta (The Cave) for lunch. This unique restaurant is located in a cave just a few minute’s walk from Teootihuacan entrance 5, behind the Pyramid of the Sun.

To enter La Gruta you’ll walk downstairs into a semi-exposed, decorated cave – and it is truly a unique place to dine on pre-Hispanic influenced food. It’s a touristy destination, but one that makes for a very unique experience. 

Note: La Gruta gets very busy, so make reservations ahead of time. 

Enjoy an Early Dinner  

Depending on what time you get back from Teotihuacan, it will likely be time to start getting ready for dinner and Lucha Libre! 

Azul Historico  

Located in the Historic Center of CDMX, Azul Historico is one of the most famous and popular restaurants in the city. Located in the Downtown Hotel, this 17th-Century open air courtyard is a stunning place to dine. They have a large menu with a good selection of vegetarian options. 

Azul Historico books up quickly, so advanced reservations are recommended. 

Plantasia 

Plantasia , located in Roma Norte, is plant-based, but don’t let that deter you, it’s so good! The menu focuses on Asian inspired dishes and everything I tried was so delicious. 

The restaurant itself is beautifully designed in a minimalist, modern style with some sunken tables and tons of greenery. This was one of my favorite meals in Mexico City. 

Watch a Lucha Libre Fight 

Watching a Lucha Libre fight while in Mexico City is such a fun experience! Even if you’re not a fan of professional/performative wrestling, the matches are fun to watch and such a unique experience. 

Lucha Libre fighters (luchadores) wear colorful masks and their wrestling routines are planned and choreographed in advance. As such, there’s almost always a predetermined winner. There are both male and female fighters who perform in matches throughout the evening. 

Lucha Libre fights often tell a story that the announcer shares with the crowd throughout the fights. If you don’t speak Spanish, you won’t fully understand the stories, but you’ll definitely get the gist from watching. Even if you don’t understand the commentators, the fights are still fun to watch. 

In the stadium you can buy drinks, beer and snacks to enjoy while watching the fights.

Lucha Libre isn’t boxing (I was worried about this beforehand), so no one is actually getting hurt. It’s all staged to be a fun performance. 

The matches take place Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays at Arena Mexico at 7:30pm, and tickets start as low as $7 USD. Good(ish) seats will cost anywhere from $10-$15 USD and the best seats will go for $25 or more. 

The fights usually last about 2-3 hours, but I ended up leaving after about 1.5. I’m very happy I went, and had a lot of fun, but that was long enough for me! 

You can book tickets on Ticketmaster , but make sure you’re getting them for Arena Mexico.

NOTE: Lucha Libre fights, at Arena Mexico, are located not far from Roma Norte or el Centro Historico. However, it’s important to note that the fight is held in the Doctores neighborhood, which is regarded as one of CDMX’s most unsafe areas. 

Ubering to/from the match is absolutely safe, especially because it’s such a big tourist attraction, but I wouldn’t recommend walking there – especially if it’s a long distance. 

If you prefer to go with a tour group, there are many options available:

• Lucha Libre Experience and Mezcal Tasting
• Lucha Libre Experience in Mexico City

Check Out a Cute Breakfast Spot 

After breakfast, hop in an Uber or take the 45ish minute walk to Chapultepec Castle and the Anthropology Museum. 

Note: these museums, along with tons of others, are located in the beautiful Bosque de Chapultepec (Chapultepec Forest). Bosque de Chapultepec is a 1,700 acre park area that houses museums, playgrounds, bathrooms, green spaces and lakes. It is beautiful and makes for a great place to spend the day exploring. 

Explore the National History Museum, Chapultepec Castle 

Chapultepec Castle is one of the most beautiful places to visit in Mexico City. The castle was built in 1785 and has served a variety of purposes throughout history, including the Presidential home, a military school, and its current use, the National Museum of History. 

The museum showcases artifacts and art from different eras throughout Mexico’s history. In addition to the interesting exhibits, the castle itself is beautiful inside and out. From its balconies and terraces you have amazing views of downtown Mexico City. Make sure you give yourself at least an hour and half to explore this museum. 

Note: Chapultepec Castle is closed Mondays, and entrance is approximately $4 USD. 

Visit the National Museum of Anthropology 

From Chapultepec Castle, take the 20 minute walk to the National Museum of Anthropology . This is a beautiful walk through a lovely park area where you’ll pass by a variety of museums. On the way you’ll see the Modern Art Museum , the Botanical Gardens , and the Contemporary Art Museum , just to name a few. 

You’ll also pass by stands selling food and drinks if you’d like to pick up a snack before spending a couple hours at the Anthropology Museum. 

This museum is both the largest and most visited in Mexico, and with good reason, it is so well organized and interesting. The museum has 23 exhibits that explore Mexico’s history and ancient civilizations, including popular exhibits about the Mayans and Aztecs. 

There are so many interesting artifacts to see and, in addition, the museum features impressive recreations of anthropological sites. You could easily spend a full day here and not see everything, but  for a first visit I recommend at least two hours. 

Entrance to the National Museum of Anthropology is around $4.50 USD and is open Tuesday-Sunday. You can buy tickets in advance online, or at the door when you arrive. 

Go Shopping in Polanco 

From the Anthropology Museum, take the 15-20 minute walk to Polanco. You can also Uber, but it will almost certainly be just as fast to walk. 

Polanco is an upscale neighborhood known for its shopping. On the main shopping street, Avenida Presidente Masaryk, you’ll find tons of luxury stores and brands. In addition to the designer stores, you’ll also find more affordable options like Zara and The North Face. 

It’s easy to spend a couple hours wandering around Polanco, grabbing a coffee in a cafe, and enjoying the shops. Be sure to also stop by Tane Jewelry Store to check out their “Mexico Mi Amor” wall – it’s a great photo stop. 

Relax and People Watch in Parque Lincoln 

Parque Lincoln is a great place to stop and relax after a few hours of shopping. Here you’ll find tons of dogs, nice shaded areas and a small pond where kids race model boats,

Enjoy a Fancy Dinner  in Polanco

For your last night in Mexico City, Polanco is a great place to be as it’s home to a number of well known restaurants. The  most famous is Pujol , which was named by the Wall Street Journal as the best restaurant in Mexico City – so it’s definitely worth a visit, if you can get a reservation. 

Could I get a reservation when I was in Mexico City? Unfortunately, no. However, this restaurant came recommended by so many of my friends and fellow travelers, that I still wanted to include it in this post. You will likely need to make a reservation at least 6 weeks to 2 months in advance.  

If you can’t get a reservation at Pujol, don’t worry, there’s many other great restaurants in the Polanco area.

Restaurants in Polanco: 

• Comedor Jacinta   

Polanco is known for being an expensive area and many of the restaurants are definitely on the pricey side. However, there are certainly more affordable options as well. 

• El Turix – a hole in the wall taco stand featured in Bon Appetit  
• Cafe Toscano
• La Casa de Toño (a popular chain) 

4 days in Mexico City will fly by! The city is packed full of such fun and unique things to do, see and eat. I hope this CDMX itinerary has been helpful and please let me know if you have any questions. 

Other posts to check out:

• Your Go To Mexico Packing Guide: FREE Printable Packing List for Mexico
• What to Wear in Mexico – Vacation Lookbook and Outfit Inspiration

Things to Know When Visiting Mexico City

• The short answer is yes. Mexico City is safe to visit, but like with any major city you need to be aware of your surroundings and belongings. The major touristy areas are very safe to explore and walk around in, but if you ever feel nervous, Uber instead of walking.
• While more expensive than other areas in Mexico, Mexico City is still extremely affordable. It’s a great place for budget travelers as food, activities, accommodations and transportation are all very affordable.
• I did and it was totally fine. If you’re nervous about the water quality, however, many travelers use bottled water to brush their teeth.
• For a first trip you’ll want at least 4 days. However, Mexico City is huge and full of things to do, so you could easily spend weeks exploring!
• In major stores and restaurants, yes. But always carry pesos for buying street food, souvenirs and for other small purchases.

Note: This guide to 4 days in Mexico includes affiliate links. Read our disclosure  here .

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Mexico City   Travel Guide

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16 Best Things To Do in Mexico City

Mexico City, officially known as Ciudad de México (CDMX), is a growing and vibrant metropolis nestled in the heart of Mexico. The capital city of Mexico offers a blend of history, culture and gastronomy that attracts millions of annual visitors. From

• All Things To Do

Museo Nacional de Antropología Museo Nacional de Antropología

Located within the sprawling Chapultepec Forest , the Museo Nacional de Antropología (National Museum of Anthropology) showcases artifacts from Mexico's pre-Columbian era, dating from about 100 B.C. to A.D. 1521. Housed within the facility’s 22 rooms are artifacts, including the famous Aztec Calendar Stone, known as Piedra del Sol, as well as the ancient statue of Xochipilli, the Aztec god of art, games, beauty, dance and maize (among others). The museum offers a look at how tradition, culture and life were formed in all regions of Mexico, and it also educates visitors on how Mexico’s indigenous descendants live today. 

Past visitors said this is a must-see if you’re interested in the ancient cultures of Mexico/Mesoamerica. Reviewers appreciated that the explanatory text features English translations. The museum is so extensive that many travelers said you can spend a whole day exploring the many collections and exhibits and recommend giving yourself plenty of time to visit. As one of the largest and most visited museums in Mexico, the grounds are also home to a gift shop, a cafeteria and the National Library of Anthropology and History. 

Bosque de Chapultepec Bosque de Chapultepec free

The main park in Mexico City, Bosque de Chapultepec (Chapultepec Forest) was once the temporary home of the Aztec empire after its citizens migrated to modern-day Mexico City in the 13th century. Today, the 1,600-acre Chapultepec is Mexico City's largest park and is popular among families seeking respite from the busy and crowded city.

Divided into three sections, the park is home to many cultural interests, such as the presidential residence, the former presidential palace, a zoo and several museums (including the highly recommended Museo Nacional de Antropología ). The park also hosts numerous military monuments and effigies of Aztec kings, as well as restaurants and playgrounds, plus lots of green space for stretching. What's more, the park features a large lake, where visitors and locals alike can rent pedal boats to cruise around the water (a particular highlight for kids). On the weekends, local vendors fill the park and sell everything from souvenirs to art to snacks.

Palacio de Bellas Artes Palacio de Bellas Artes free

Considered the cultural center of Mexico City, the Palacio de Bellas Artes (Palace of Fine Arts) is a must-visit. The exterior of this 20th-century palace showcases art nouveau and art deco-style architecture, while the inside features marble floors and vaulted glass windows. 

In addition to its architectural grandeur, the building hosts cultural events in the national theater, including music, dance, theater, opera and literary performances. The museum at the palace also houses several famous murals, including the work of the famous Mexican muralist Rufino Tamayo. On the top floor, you'll find the National Museum of Architecture, which showcases the work and lives of famous Mexican architects, and multiple art museums and galleries. 

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Hot Air Balloon Flight over Teotihuacan, from Mexico City

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Zócalo (Plaza de la Constitución) Zócalo (Plaza de la Constitución) free

U.S. News Insider Tip: The Zócalo attracts throngs of visitors and locals, so visit in the early morning or afternoon during a weekday to avoid the heaviest crowds. – Kayla Hui

Officially known as Plaza de la Constitución, El Zócalo is the main public square and one of the most recognizable places in Mexico City. It’s also one of the world’s largest city squares. It contains a giant Mexican flag at its center and has been the centerpiece of public gatherings since the days of the Aztec empire (it was considered the ceremonial center of Tenochtitlán). The site also hosts annual, widely attended religious events during Holy Week and for Corpus Christi, as well as fairs, concerts, and parades. Several historic buildings also border the square, including the city's national cathedral , the National Palace  and federal buildings.

Museo Frida Kahlo Museo Frida Kahlo

One of the best-known museums in Mexico City exhibits the life and work of its most famous artist: Frida Kahlo. The museum, located in the Coyoacan suburb, is also known as La Casa Azul (The Blue House), and was Kahlo's former residence. It hosts some impressive examples of her works, but travelers say that the best part of visiting the house is seeing where the artist lived and painted with her husband, artist Diego Rivera. Along with paintings by both artists, folk art, photos, documents, books and furnishings, the house also displays personal objects.

Recent visitors to the property said it's a must-see for fans of the artist, saying it shows her life and work in a very personal light. Reviewers were particularly impressed with the display of her clothing and dresses. If you want to take photos, there is an additional modest “permit” fee. 

Basílica de Santa María de Guadalupe Basílica de Santa María de Guadalupe free

U.S. News Insider Tip: During the summer months, pack a hat and water bottle (there is little shade within the complex). If you plan to use the bathroom on site, bring a couple of pesos with you to use the bathroom and buy toilet paper. – Kayla Hui 

The Basílica de Santa María de Guadalupe (Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe) is an important religious site in Mexico City. Construction for the first shrine built to honor the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe started in 1695 on Tepeyac Hill. However, nearly 300 years' worth of construction and environmental damage threatened the integrity of the basilica, so a new basilica was built on the same plaza in the 1970s.

Templo Mayor Templo Mayor

Before Spanish colonization, Templo Mayor served as the religious center for the Aztec people. When Spanish conquistadors arrived in the early 16th century, the temple was among many structures that were destroyed and a new cathedral was built on top of the ruins. It wasn't until 1978 that the temple dedicated to the Aztec gods Huitzilopochtli and Tláloc (gods of war and water) was unearthed in the heart of Mexico City. Today, the area remains an active archeological site and the adjoining museum houses thousands of  artifacts, including 2,500 wooden objects from the site. 

Recent visitors said it's fascinating to see the ancient ruins that are tucked away in the center of the city. Many said it's worth spending time in the museum as well, but the site and scale can't match up to the massive Museo Nacional de Antropología . Still, the whole complex has been deemed a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is one of Mexico City's most popular attractions. If you’re visiting during the summer months, travelers suggest you time your visit for the morning to avoid the sweltering midday heat. Reviewers also warn that most of the information is listed in Spanish only.

Museo de Arte Popular Museo de Arte Popular

U.S. News Insider Tip: Ditch the large bags and water bottles prior to your visit as you may be denied entry. – Kayla Hui

This folk art museum features handicrafts from all across Mexico and details the country's history and its many cultures. If you want to find out more about the country’s indigenous communities, this is the place to go, according to travelers. Exhibits include glasswork from Tecali, pottery from Michoacán, masks from Chiapas and alebrijes , the colorful painted animal figures from Oaxaca, among other treasures. Make sure to take time to admire the building itself – the 1920s art deco building was the former headquarters of the fire department.

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Chalpultepec Castle Chalpultepec Castle

U.S. News Insider Tip: Sundays are free for all residents of Mexico and expats living in Mexico, so try to avoid visiting that day if you can. It can get crowded, so it’s recommended to go in the morning when the castle first opens. – Kayla Hui

Constructed beginning in 1725, Chalpultepec Castle has served many purposes in its centuries of use; it was a military academy, an observatory, and the only castle in North America to house rulers, including Emperor Maximilian I and his wife Empress Carlota. It would later be established as the National Museum of History by Lázaro Cárdenas in 1939, which would open the castle to visitors. Located at the entrance of Chalpultepec Park , it’s a historical site that can’t be missed on your next visit to Mexico City. 

Catedral Metropolitana Catedral Metropolitana free

Mexico's national cathedral – the vaulting, austere, ornate church on the Zócalo' s north end – was once the site of an ancient Aztec precinct, so it has housed the city's spiritual core for centuries. The cathedral was built between 1573 and 1813 after the Spanish conquest of Tenochtitlan and is considered one of Mexico City's many must-see attractions. What’s more, the cathedral is one of the largest churches in Latin America. It’s believed that the materials used to construct the church were taken from the destroyed pyramids and structures belonging to the Aztecs. Highlights of the massive cathedral include five naves, 14 chapels, two of the largest 18th-century organs in the Americas, 150 windows and a painting by famed Spanish artist Bartolome Esteban Murillo.

Depending on your interest in Mexican history and architecture, you could spend anywhere from an hour to a half a day at the cathedral (it’s free to enter). Past visitors recommended paying to take a tour of the interior with a member of the cathedral’s staff, who reviewers say offer a wealth of information about the cathedral’s far-reaching history. According to recent visitors, tours cost approximately 100 Mexican pesos (about $6). Recent visitors said the massive structure is stunning to behold, and even if you don't want to take the time to explore the inside, it's worth the photo-op of the exterior. The cathedral is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. and admission is free. Many of the best Mexico City walking tours make stops here, which can be another way to hear an in-depth retelling of the cathedral’s history and significance.  For more information, including Mass times, visit the cathedral's website (in Spanish).

Museo Soumaya Museo Soumaya free

From exceptional architecture to more than 66,000 featured works, Museo Soumaya is one of Mexico City’s most iconic museums. Established in 1994, Museo Soumaya’s main goal is to preserve and exhibit Mexico and Europe’s artistry. Currently, it houses the largest collection of works by Auguste Rodin outside of France, in addition to artwork by Diego Rivera, Titian, Picasso, Monet and more. 

Beyond the art, the architecture alone is worth seeing. The exterior of the six-story building is wrapped in mirrored hexagons, and the building is the brainchild of Mexican architect Fernando Romero. Recent travelers say Museo Soumaya is reminiscent of New York City’s Guggenheim (both museums are architecturally stunning and feature a circular interior with each floor organized by art type). Some reviewers recommend starting your visit at the top and winding your way down. 

Palacio Nacional Palacio Nacional free

The National Palace holds the federal executive branch of the Mexican government and sits along Mexico City's main public square, El Zócalo . The palace itself is a massive, ornate building that contains several gardens, murals and fountains in the Spanish Renaissance architectural style. Its highlights are several Diego Rivera murals painted in panoramic style across the palace's walls, which past visitors say are a must-see. These murals depict the stages of Mexican history, from pre-Columbian days to the current age.

Because the Mexican president lives and works within the palace, visitors can only access the site on a guided tour. Tours are free, but can’t be booked in advance online. According to recent visitors, you must go to the ticket office at the Museum of Art of the Ministry of Finance & Public Credit, where you can inquire about tour availability and make reservations in person (this is also where tours depart from). Some reviewers reported success booking tickets in advance by emailing [email protected] with information about the preferred tour date and number of people attending. Along the approximately hourlong tours, you’ll see the Rivera mural collections and the courtyards. You may also get the chance to glimpse the exterior of the legislative chambers. 

Museo Casa Luis Barragán Museo Casa Luis Barragán

Luis Barragán was a prominent Mexican architect renowned for his modernist style, and his former home – which was first constructed in 1947 and now functions as a museum – is one of the finest examples of his work. The museum is an off-the-beaten-path attraction that travelers say will please all, even those not schooled in architectural history. The house is known for its vivid colors, brilliant use of natural light and its impressive garden with a maze of corridors and trees. In 2004, it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

Recent visitors said the history of the house, in addition to its interesting architecture, is captivating. However, a handful of recent reviewers were disappointed with the ticket reservation process. To visit, you must book a self-guided or guided tour (available in Spanish and English). Self-guided visits are only available on Thursdays at select times. Tickets for self-guided tours cost 450 Mexican pesos (about $26) per person (note that children 12 and younger are not permitted in the house). Guided tours are available at select times Monday through Wednesday, Friday and Saturday Tickets for guided tours cost more. Tickets are released every Tuesday at noon (Mexico City time).  

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Teotihuacan Private Tour from Mexico City

(1073 reviews)

from $ 126.25

Xochimilco boat tour with food and unlimited drinks

(117 reviews)

from $ 62.31

Torre Latinoamericana Torre Latinoamericana

Open since 1956, Torre Latinoamericana, the 44-story skyscraper in Centro Histórico, is the place to go if you want the best views of the city. Similar to the Empire State Building in New York City , this tower offers visitors jaw-dropping views from its observation deck and restaurant, making it the perfect opportunity to pull out your camera for that Instagram-worthy picture. 

Recent visitors recommended heading up to the top of the tower during sunset to admire the shifting light as it illuminates buildings like the neighboring Palace of Fine Arts. Travelers also warned that if smog levels are high, you won’t be able to see much from the tower’s peak. Some reviewers recommend spending time in the on-site museum, which details the history of Mexico City and the construction of the tower. 

Teotihuacán Teotihuacán

U.S. News Insider Tip: There is no shade inside the archeological site, so you’ll want to wear a hat. It’s also helpful to have a small backpack to hold a water bottle, sunscreen and toilet paper to use in the washrooms at the site. – Kayla Hui

One of many UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the Mexico City region, Teotihuacán ( teh -o-tee-wa- can ) contains some of the largest pre-Hispanic pyramids in all of Mexico. The site contains many popular constructions, including the Palace of the Plumed Butterfly, which showcases various columns of winged creatures, and the awesome Pyramid of the Sun, which sits at the heart of the small city. The nearby museum, Museo de la Sitio, also holds many artifacts from the period.

Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) free

The Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico (Central University City Campus of the National University of Mexico) includes 32 academic programs, the Mexican Olympic stadium, a Mexican cultural center, a nature preserve and the city's Central Library. The main campus is now designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The city's famous muralists have made their mark on the campus, and travelers recommend you check out the work of famous painter David Alfaro Siqueiros at the Rectorate Tower or the work of Juan O'Gorman at the Central Library. The campus also holds the University Museum of Contemporary Art, an excellent spot for viewing Mexico's more recent cultural offerings. The sculpture garden at the art museum is a particular highlight for past visitors, as is the botanic garden.

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Mexico City Travel Guide

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One of the world’s mega-cities, with over 25 million people occupying a shallow mountain bowl at over 2400m above sea level, Mexico City has to be seen to be believed. Bursting beyond the official federal district, the sprawling city is edgy, yet laid-back and cosmopolitan. Around the city lie the chief relics of the pre-Hispanic cultures of central Mexico. Here you'll find the massive pyramids of Teotihuacán and the main Toltec site at Tula . Read our Mexico City travel guide for everything you need to know before you go.

A brief history of Mexico City

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Tailor-made trips for   Mexico

The Aztecs founded their capital of Tenochtitlán in 1325 on an island in the middle of a lake. From here their empire grew to cover the whole of central Mexico. Hernán Cortés and his troops arrived in 1519, taking the Aztec emperor, Moctezuma II, prisoner and attacking Aztec temples. Growing unrest led to rebellion, and in 1520, Moctezuma was killed – according to the Spanish, by his own people. The Spaniards fled but returned, stronger, a year later to lay siege to Tenochtitlán.

The Spanish systematically destroyed Aztec culture and created a new, bigger city. A turbulent period of disease and sinking buildings followed, and by the 1850s, the city comprised little more than the area around the Zócalo and Alameda.

From late 1870 to 1911, however, the dictator Porfirio Díaz presided over an aggressive building programme that fuelled growth. By the 1910 Revolution, Mexico City’s residents numbered over 400,000, regaining for the first time in four centuries the pre-Conquest population.

During the Revolution, thousands fled to rapidly industrializing Mexico City for work. By the mid-1940s the city’s population quadrupled, and shantytowns began springing up and then mushrooming. This expansion strained the transport system, resulting in the construction of a Metro system in the late 1960s.

Urban growth continues today, spilling out beyond the limits of the Distrito Federal. Despite the spread, Mexico City remains one of the world’s most densely populated cities. It has an long list of social and physical problems, including a vulnerability to earthquakes. The last big one, in 1985, killed over 9,000 people, made 100,000 homeless and skewed many of the city’s buildings.

The eternal heart of the city, the capital’s main plaza is surrounded by its cathedral and the ruins of Aztec Tenochtitlán . The excellent Museo del Templo Mayor helps set the temples in context.

Not only an architectural masterpiece in its own right, with a smashing Art Deco interior, the Palacio de Bellas Artes is also home to some of the city‘s most impressive murals.

Museo Mural Diego Rivera is the home of Rivera's most famous Mexican mural, depicting just about everybody from Mexican history, all out on a Sunday afternoon stroll in the Alameda.

• Basílica de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe The Basílica is in fact a whole series of churches, chapels and shrines set around an enormous stone-flagged plaza. It's little wonder that it can take a 5-hour tour to see the lot!

The Museo Nacional de Antropología is the country’s finest museum, with displays on all of Mexico’s major pre-Columbian cultures.

• Mariachi You’ll find mariachi played the length and breadth of the country but most notably in Mexico City’s Plaza Garibaldi.

Visit the houses where Frida Kahlo and León Trotsky lived, spend an evening checking out the local bars, then come back for the colourful Sunday market. You can book onto tours that take in the major sites.

Teotihuacán is the largest pre-Hispanic site in the country, dominated by the huge Pirámide de Sol and only slightly less huge Pirámide de la Luna. If you're feeling flush, splash out on a hot-air balloon flight over the pyramids.

Once a silver-mining centre, now a silver-buying centre, this whitewashed hillside town makes a welcome stop on the road to Acapulco. You can go on a tour and admire its silver jewellery, which is made in hundreds of workshops here.

A huge collection of works by Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo.

Rent a boat and soak up the carnival atmosphere, flowers and traditional floating gardens at the Mexico City suburb of Xochimilco .

The frenetic site of massed mariachi bands competing for your attention.

Explore Mexico City’s largest and most vibrant market.

Mexico’s crazy, high-octane capital may initially seem to lack the colour and charm of some of the country’s smaller towns, but it can be pretty too, and there’s certainly no denying its dynamism. Visit Mexico City and you’ll be rewarded with museums, murals and markets galore, while beyond the bustling colonial core lies a cluster of upmarket districts and leafy neighbourhoods.

Here are some of the best places to visit in Mexico City.

The Zócalo and around

The heart of Mexico City is the Zócalo, built by the Spanish right over the devastated ceremonial centre of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlán . Extraordinary uncovered ruins provide the Zócalo’s most compelling attraction, chief of which is the Templo Mayor. There’s also a wealth of great colonial buildings, among them the huge cathedral and the Palacio Nacional with its striking Diego Rivera murals. West of the Zócalo the centro histórico stretches through the main commercial district past the Museo Nacional de Arte to the sky-scraping Torre Latinoamericana and the Palacio de Bellas Artes with its gorgeous Art Deco interior.

Around the Alameda

Originally an Aztec market and later the site where the Inquisition burned its victims at the stake, the formal Alameda parkland you see now dates from the nineteenth century. Around the Alameda is a clutch of museums, including Museo de Tequila y Mezcal, which tells the story of Mexico’s best-known liquors, and the Museo Mural Diego Rivera, with the artist’s famed Sueño de una Tarde Dominical en la Alameda .

The Monumento a la Revolución heralds the more upmarket central suburbs, chiefly the Zona Rosa. You’ll know you’re there as the streets are all named after famous cities. Packed into this tiny area are hundreds of bars, restaurants, hotels and shops, all teeming with a vast number of tourists and a cross-section of Mexico City’s aspiring middle classes. Mexico City’s gay village can be found around the northern end of Amberes.

Roma and Condesa

South of the Zona Rosa lie the leafy residential districts of Roma and Condesa. Both suburbs were developed in the 1930s and 1940s, but as the city expanded they became unfashionable and run-down. That all changed in the 1990s when artists and the bohemian fringe were drawn here by low rents, decent housing and proximity to the city centre. Small-time galleries sprang up and the first of the bars and cafés opened. Condesa, in particular, is now one of the best areas for good eating in the city, brimming with pavement cafés and bistro-style restaurants.

Accommodation in Mexico City ranges from budget hostels to some of the swankiest hotels in the country. Book ahead, as the best-value places can fill up quickly. Most places have 24hr reception desks and are geared for late arrivals and early departures. With reasonably cheap taxi fares into the Zócalo or Zona Rosa, it seldom makes financial sense to stay near the bus stations or airport. If you arrive especially late, there are places to stay that are very handy for the airport and Terminal del Norte.

There are reasonably priced restaurants, cafés, taquerías and juice stands on every block. The choice of where to eat in Mexico City ranges from traditional coffee houses to on-the-go lunch counters, taking in expensive international and rock-bottom Mexican cooking along the way. Food stalls can be found in markets throughout the city; Merced is the biggest, but not a terribly pleasant place to eat. At the back of Plaza Garibaldi, there’s a whole market hall given over to nothing but food stands, each vociferously competing with its neighbours.

Club-oriented nightlife starts late in Mexico City. Live acts often hit the stage after 11pm and few places really getting going before midnight. Cuban music is particularly popular, and with Cuba just a short flight away, Mexico City hosts a lot of the island’s emerging talent. Bars range from dirt-cheap pulquerías and cantinas to upscale lounges and hotel bars. As elsewhere in the country, cantinas and pulquerías are still largely a male preserve. The Zona Rosa (pink zone) is Mexico City’s gay zone, and in particular the northernmost section of Amberes between Hamburgo and Reforma, where you’ll find a slew of gay and lesbian bars.

An odd hangover from Aztec times is the practice of devoting a whole street to one particular trade, which occurs to some extent throughout the city. There are blocks where you can buy nothing but stationery, while other areas are packed exclusively with shoe shops and still others only sell musical instruments. To buy crafts, there is no need to visit the place of origin – shops in Mexico City and all the big resorts gather the best and most popular items from around the country. For bargain hunters, the mercado (market) is the place to head; La Merced is Mexico City’s largest and most vibrant market.

This section of the Mexico City travel guide will look at some of the best activities in the capital.

Lucha libre

Though its popularity has waned in recent years, lucha libre , or wrestling, remains one of Mexico’s most avidly followed spectator sports. Mexican wrestling is generally faster, with more complex moves, and more combatants in the ring at any one time than you would normally see in an American or British bout. More important, however, is the maintenance of stage personas, most of whom, heroes or villains, wear masks. Catch a 3.5-hour show if you can.

There is no event more quintessentially Mexican than the bullfight . Rooted in Spanish machismo and imbued with multiple layers of symbolism and interpretation, it transcends a mere battle of man against animal. If you don’t mind the inherent cruelty of the spectacle, it’s worth attending a corrida de toros to see this integral part of the Mexican experience. Plaza México, a giant 48,000-seat arena in Mexico City, is the largest bullring in the world.

Ask any local what to see in Mexico City and they’ll say fútbol, which is undoubtedly Mexico’s most popular sport. The capital is one of the best places to see a football match. The biggest game in the domestic league, “El Clásico”, between Chivas from Guadalajara and América from Mexico City, fills the city’s 150,000-seater Aztec stadium to capacity. There are usually at least two games every Sunday afternoon from January to June and August to November.

Taking part in a local fiesta is one of the most exuberant things to do in Mexico City, and the following is just a teaser of the country’s jam-packed event programme:

• Día de los Santos Reyes (Jan 6). Celebrations include a fiesta with dancing at Nativitas, a suburb near Xochimilco.
• Bendicíon de los Animales (Jan 17). Children’s pets and peasants’ farm animals are taken to the cathedral to be blessed.
• Día de San Pedro (June 29). Marked by traditional dancing in San Pedro Actopan, on the southern outskirts of the DF.
• Día de Santa Marta (July 25). Celebrated in Milpa Alta, near Xochimilco, with Aztec dances and mock fights between Moors and Christians.
• Independence Day (Sept 15). The president of the republic proclaims the famous Grito at 11pm in the Zócalo, followed by the ringing of the Campana de Dolores and a huge firework display.
• Día de Santa Cecilia (Nov 22). Santa Cecilia is the patron saint of musicians, and her fiesta attracts orchestras and mariachi bands from all over to Santa Cecilia Tepetlapa, near Xochimilco.
• Día de la Señora de Guadalupe (Dec 12). The saint’s day of Mexico’s favourite Virgin heralds a massive pilgrimage to the Basilica of Guadalupe, running for several days, with a more secular celebration of music and dancing.

The capital is where the Mexican extremes of wealth and poverty are most apparent. Such financial disparity fuels theft, but just take the same precautions you would in any large city. Keep your valuables – especially credit or debit cards – in the hotel safe. Don’t flash large wads of money around and keep an eye on your camera and other valuables in busy market areas.

At night, avoid the barrio known as Doctores and the area around Lagunilla market - both centres of the street drug trade, and therefore opportunist crime.

Note that mugging is not the only danger – abduction for ransom is increasingly common too.

Taxis have a bad reputation and, though drivers are mostly helpful and courteous, it is best not to hail one off the street. Read our Mexico City Guide for more safety advice .

Look beyond the capital’s frenetic, high-octane core, and you’ll discover a raft of enticing places to visit around Mexico City. Spreading itself furthest to the south, the urban sprawl has swallowed up a series of old villages. These harbour the colonial suburbs of Coyoacán and San Ángel, the archaeological site of Cuicuilco and the canals of Xochimilco. The area north of the city centre has less to offer, but two sites of compelling interest are the emotive Plaza de las Tres Culturas and the great Basílica de Guadalupe. Further out, you’ll find the pyramids of Tenayuca and Santa Cecilia Acatitlán, the city’s two most dramatically preserved remains of Aztec architecture.

With its markets, ancient mansions and high-priced shops around flower-draped patios, San Ángel is a very exclusive place to live. It is also one of the most inviting places to visit around Mexico City, packed with little restaurants and cafés where you can sit outside and watch the crowds go by.

Around 3km east of San Ángel lies Coyoacán , another colonial township that has been absorbed by the city. Cortés based himself in Coyoacán during the siege of Tenochtitlán , and continued to live here while the old city was torn down. While the Plaza Central is the focus of the town, no visit to Mexico is complete without strolling out to the northern reaches to the Frida Kahlo and Leon Trotsky museums.

The floating gardens adjoining the suburb of Xochimilco offer an intense carnival atmosphere every weekend. Renting a colourful boat is one of the top things to do in Mexico City, as you’ll be ferried around the picturesque canals while marimba players and market stallholders compete for your attention.

The Plaza de las Tres Culturas is the site of the ancient city of Tlatelolco, located to the north of Tenochtitlán . Today, a lovely colonial church rises in the midst of the city’s excavated ruins, exemplifying the second of the three cultures from which the plaza takes its name.

The 20m-high pyramid in the main square at Tenayuca, a suburb just outside the city limits, is another site that predates Tenochtitlán by a long chalk. Indeed, there are those who claim it was the capital of the tribe that destroyed Tula . The pyramid that survives dates from the period of Aztec dominance and is an almost perfect miniature replica of the great temples of Tlatelolco and Tenochtitlán.

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Top image: Palacio de Bellas Artes or Palace of Fine Arts, a famous theater,museum and music venue in Mexico City © Kamira/Shutterstock

Soccer and wrestling may be more popular, but there is no event more quintessentially Mexican than the bullfight . Rooted in Spanish machismo and imbued with multiple layers of symbolism and interpretation, it transcends a mere battle of man against animal. If you don’t mind the inherent cruelty of the spectacle (essentially you’re watching an animal being artfully tortured to death), it’s worth attending a corrida de toros to see this integral part of the Mexican experience. It is a sport that transcends class barriers; every Sunday afternoon during the winter season men and women from all walks of Mexican society file into the stadium – though some admittedly end up in plush sombra (shade) seats while the masses occupy concrete sol (sun) terraces.

Each corrida lasts around two hours and involves six bulls, all from one ranch, with each of three matadors taking two bulls. Typically there will be two Mexican matadors and one from Spain, which still produces the best performers. Each fight is divided into three suertes (acts) or tercios (thirds), each announced by a trumpet blast. During the first tercio , several toreros with large capes tire the bull in preparation for the picadores who, from their mounts atop heavily padded and blindfolded horses, attempt to force a lance between the bull’s shoulder blades to further weaken him. The toreros then return for the second tercio , in which one of their number (and sometimes the matador himself) will try to stab six metal-tipped spikes (known as bandilleras ) into the bull in as clean and elegant a manner as possible.

Exhausted and frustrated, but by no means docile, the bull is now considered ready for the third and final tercio , the suerte de muleta . The matador continues to tire the bull while pulling off as many graceful and daring moves as possible. By now the crowd will have sensed the bravery and finesse of the matador and the spirit of the bull he is up against, and shouts of “¡Olé!” will reverberate around the stadium with every pass. Eventually the matador will entice the bull to challenge him head-on, standing there with its hooves together. As it charges he will thrust his sword between its shoulder blades and, if it is well executed, the bull will crumple to the sand. However barbaric you might think it is, no one likes to see the bull suffer and even the finest performance will garner the matador little praise without a clean kill. Successful matadors may be awarded one of the bull’s ears, rarely two, and perhaps two or three times a season the tail as well. An especially courageous bull may be spared and put out to stud, a cause for much celebration, but this is a rare spectacle.

Puebla’s expansion in recent years has made Cholula , 15km to the west, virtually a suburb. Nonetheless, it retains its small-town charm and has one abiding reason to visit: the ruins of Cholula . A rival of Teotihuacán at its height, and the most powerful city in the country between the fall of Teotihuacán and the rise of Tula, Cholula was, at the time of the Conquest, a vast city of some four hundred temples, famed as a shrine to Quetzalcoatl and for the excellence of its pottery (a trade dominated by immigrant Mixtecs). But it paid dearly for an attempt, inspired by its Aztec allies, to ambush Cortés on his march to Tenochtitlán: the chieftains were slaughtered, their temples destroyed and churches built in their place. The Spaniards claimed to have constructed 365 churches here, one for each day of the year. Although there are a lot of churches, the true figure certainly doesn’t live up to the claim. There may well be 365 chapels within the churches, though, which is already a few hundred more than the village population could reasonably need.

Arriving in Cholula, you can’t miss the Nuestra Señora de los Remedios , picturesquely sited atop a hill with Popocatépetl in the background. If you climb up to it, you can buy snacks such as chapulines (fried grasshoppers) on the way. What’s not immediately apparent is that the hill is in fact the remains of the Great Pyramid of Cholula – the Pirámide Tepanapa – the largest pyramid ever constructed, though it’s now ruined, overgrown and really not much to look at. At 66m, it is lower than the largest of the Egyptian pyramids but with each side measuring 350m it is also squatter and bulkier. As at other sites, the outer shell was built over a series of nested pyramids, constructed between 200 BC and 800 AD.

The archeological site

The archeological site around and underneath the pyramid is usually accessed from an entrance on San Andrés through a 400m-long series of tunnels dug by archeologists. Though undoubtedly fascinating, the ruins are a good deal less impressive than some of the more famed sites around the Valley of México. The ring of superimposed structures around the Patio de los Altares is certainly worth a look and there are some fine murals , but these can be better appreciated in the site museum where replicas are kept.

The tunnels

Even when you can go inside, the section open to the public is just a fraction of the 8km of exploratory tunnels which honeycomb the pyramid. They’re well lit and capacious enough for most people to walk upright, but there’s still a palpable sense of adventure as you spur off down side tunnels, which reveal elements of earlier temples and steep ceremonial stairways that appear to go on forever into the gloom. Emerging at the end of one tunnel, you’ll find an area of open-air excavations, where part of the great pyramid has been exposed alongside various lesser shrines with explanations in English of their importance.

Mexico City comes with an unenviable reputation for overcrowding, grime and crime, and to some extent this is deserved. Certainly there is pollution. The whole urban area sits in a low mountain bowl that deflects smog-clearing winds away from the city, allowing a thick blanket of haze to build up throughout the day. Conditions are particularly bad in winter, when there is no rain, and pollution levels (reported daily in the English-language newspaper, The News , thenews.com.mx ) tend to peak in the early afternoon. In response, the Hoy No Circula (“Don’t drive today”) law prohibits car use from 5am to 10pm for one day in the working week for vehicles over six years old, the day depending on the car’s numberplate. Nonetheless, those prone to respiratory problems may have some difficulty on arrival, due to the city’s air quality and altitude.

The capital is where the Mexican extremes of wealth and poverty are most apparent, with shiny, valet-parked SUVs vying for space with pavement vendors and beggars. Such financial disparity fuels theft, but just take the same precautions you would in any large city; there is no need to feel particularly paranoid. Keep your valuables – especially credit or debit cards – in the hotel safe (even cheap hotels often have somewhere secure; muggers who catch you with an ATM card may keep hold of you till they have extracted enough cash with it), don’t flash large wads of money around and keep an eye on your camera and other valuables in busy market areas. At night, avoid the barrio known as Doctores (around the Metro station of the same name, so called because the streets are named after doctors), and the area around Lagunilla market, both centres of the street drug trade, and therefore opportunist crime. Note that mugging is not the only danger – abduction for ransom is increasingly common too.

Taxis have a bad reputation and, though drivers are mostly helpful and courteous, there are reports of people being robbed or abducted (often in stolen taxis). If possible, get your hotel to call you a cab (more expensive), or call one yourself. If you do have to hail a cab in the street, always take one whose registration, on both the numberplate and the side of the vehicle, begins with an L (for “libre” – to be hailed while driving around), and which has the driver’s identification prominently displayed. Better still, find a taxi rank and take a sitio taxi that can be traced to that rank (with a number beginning in R, S or T, and again with the driver’s ID prominently displayed). Do not take taxis from the airport or bus terminals other than prepaid ones, and avoid taking those waiting outside tourist spots.

COYOACÁN is a colonial township that has been absorbed by the city. Even before the Conquest it was a sizeable place. Originally the capital of a small lakeshore kingdom, it was subjugated by the Aztecs in the mid-fifteenth century. Cortés based himself in Coyoacán during the siege of Tenochtitlán, and continued to live here while the old city was torn down and construction began on the capital of Nueva España. The focus of the area is the spacious Plaza Central, but no visit to Coyoacán is complete without strolling out to the northern reaches of the suburb to the two main sights, the Frida Kahlo and Leon Trotsky museums.

The Museo Frida Kahlo is just a few minutes’ walk from the centre of Coyoacán. The appropriately named Blue House was the Kahlos’ family home and this is where Frida was born and spent most of her life, sporadically with husband Diego Rivera, who donated the house to the nation shortly after her death. It was during Frida and Diego’s tenure here in the late 1930s that they played host to the newly arrived Leon Trotsky and his wife. Trotsky, ever fearful of assassins, apparently expressed his concern about the ease of access from a neighbouring property, and in a typically expansive gesture Diego simply bought the other house and combined the two. Continually at the centre of the capital’s leftist bohemian life, Diego and Frida hosted a coterie of artists and intellectuals at this house; D.H. Lawrence was a frequent visitor, though he had little political or artistic sympathy with Kahlo, let alone Trotsky.

Several rooms have been set aside as galleries. The first features around twenty relatively minor (and less tortured) examples of Frida’s work, from some of her early portraits through to her final work, Viva la Vida, a still life of sliced watermelons. She painted it in 1954, when the pain and trauma of her recent leg amputation had taken their toll on her painterly control, if not her spirit. Look too for a beautiful charcoal self-portrait from 1932 and the more political El Marxismo Dará la Salud a los Enfermos (Marxism Will Give Health to the Sick) from 1954. A room full of Frida’s signature tehuana dresses leads to more paintings, including over a dozen by Rivera, such as Paisaje de la Quebrada, which shows a rock face at Acapulco into which Diego painted his own face in purple. Alongside are several works by Velasco and Orozco, as well as a Klee and a Tanguy.

Interior and artefacts

Other sections of the house faithfully show the artesanía style that Frida favoured. Witness the blue and yellow kitchen with “Diego” and “Frida” picked out in tiny ceramic mugs on the wall. Its extraordinary decoration continues with bizarre papier-mâché animals and figures, and an impressive collection of retablos around the stairway. This leads up to Frida’s airy studio where her wheelchair is artfully set next to an easel and, of course, a mirror. Diego’s influence in the house is seen more through his interest in Mexico’s pre-Hispanic culture. Artefacts are scattered throughout the house and a small collection is displayed in the courtyard on a small two-step pyramid he had constructed there.

Museo Casa de León Trotsky

Trotsky’s House, or the Museo Casa de León Trotsky, where the genius of the Russian Revolution and organizer of the Red Army lived and worked, is about four blocks away and represents virtually the only memorial to Trotsky anywhere in the world. After Lenin’s death, Trotsky was forced into exile and condemned to death, and as increasing numbers of countries refused him asylum he sought refuge in Mexico in 1937, aided by Diego Rivera (at the time an ardent Trotskyite), who petitioned President Lázaro Cárdenas on his behalf. Here Stalin’s long arm finally caught up with him (see The assassination of Trotsky), despite the house being reinforced with steel gates and shutters, high walls and watchtowers. Today the fortified building seems at first a little incongruous, surrounded by the bourgeois homes of a prosperous suburb, but inside it’s a human place, set up as he left it, if rather dustier: books on the shelves, his glasses smashed on the desk and all the trappings of a fairly comfortable ordinary life – except for the bullet holes.

Since the 1970s, Frida Kahlo (1907–54) has been considered Mexico’s most internationally renowned artist, outshining even her husband, Diego Rivera, who recognized her as “the first woman in the history of art to treat, with absolute and uncompromising honesty, one might even say with impassive cruelty, those general and specific themes which exclusively affect women”. Julie Taymor’s 2002 biopic Frida, starring Salma Hayek, further consolidated her role as a feminist icon. Her work is deeply personal, centred on her insecurities and her relations with her family, her country and her politics. “I paint myself,” she said, “because I am so often alone, and because I am the subject I know best.” Her relatively short painting career was never prolific and the largest collection of her work is at the Museo Dolores Olmedo Patiño.

The daughter of a mestizo Mexican mother and Hungarian Jewish father, Frida was born in the Blue House in Coyoacán (now the Museo Frida Kahlo). When she was 6, she battled a bout of polio that left her right leg withered. She rebounded and, as a precocious 14-year-old at Mexico City’s top school, first met Diego Rivera (twenty years her senior) who was painting a mural there. She shocked her friends by declaring that she wished to conceive his child “just as soon as I convince him to cooperate”, but they didn’t meet again for many years.

Marriage to Rivera

At 18, and already breaking free of the roles then ordained for women in Mexico, Frida had begun to pursue a career in medicine when she suffered a gruesome accident. The bus she was riding in was struck by a tram, leaving her with multiple fractures and a pelvis skewered by a steel handrail. It was during the months she spent bedridden, recovering, that she first took up a paintbrush. Later in life, she reflected “I had two accidents in my life. One was the bus, the other Diego.” After her recovery she fell in with a left-leaning bunch of artists, free-thinkers and Communists where she again met Rivera. Within a year they were married: she a striking, slender woman of 21; he a massively overweight man twice her age with a frog-like face and an unparalleled reputation for womanizing. Diego went about his affairs quite publicly (including briefly with Frida’s sister, Cristina). He was furious when Frida took up with other men, but her several affairs with women seemed to delight him. After her death he wrote, “Too late now, I realized that the most wonderful part of my life had been my love for Frida.”

Artistic career

Encouraged by Diego, Frida pursued her painting career. Over half of her canvases are self-portraits: imbued with sophisticated personal symbolism, with themes of abortion, broken bones and betrayed love explored through the body set in an unlikely juxtaposition of elements.

In 1932 Frida miscarried and was hospitalized in Detroit where she painted Henry Ford Hospital. This disturbing depiction of her grief shows her naked body lying on a bed in an industrial wasteland, surrounded by a foetus, pelvic bones and surgical implements all umbilically tied back to her. After returning to Mexico, her circle of friends expanded to include Trotsky (with whom she had a brief affair), Cuban Communist Julio Antonio Mella and muralist David Siqueiros (later implicated in an attempt to kill Trotsky). By now Frida and Diego were living in paired houses in San Ángel, which allowed them to maintain relatively separate lives. In 1939 they divorced, a devastating event Frida recorded in Autoretrato con el Pelo Cortado (Self-Portrait with Cropped Hair), in which her trademark long tresses and indigenous tehuana dresses (both much loved by Diego) are replaced by Diego’s oversized suit and cropped hair. They remarried a year later, with Frida insisting on financial independence and a celibate relationship.

The injuries from her accident dogged her throughout her life, and as her physical condition worsened she found solace in her work (as well as drink and painkilling drugs), painting La Columna Rota (The Broken Column), in 1944, with her crushed spine depicted as an Ionic column. Despite increasing commercial and critical success, Frida had only one solo exhibition of her work during her lifetime, in Mexico City just a year before she died. In her later years she was wheelchair-bound, but continued the political activism she had always pursued, and died after defying medical advice and taking part in a demonstration against American intervention in Guatemala while she was convalescing from pneumonia in July 1954. By this stage, she knew she was dying; defiantly, on her last work, she daubed the words “Viva la Vida” – “Long Live Life”.

The first attempt on Trotsky’s life, in his house at Coyoacán, left more than seventy scars in the plaster of the bedroom walls. At 4am on May 24, 1940, a heavily armed group led by painter David Siqueiros (who had been a commander in the Spanish Civil War and was working under the orders of the Stalinist Mexican Communist Party) overcame the guards and pumped more than two hundred shots into the house. Trotsky, his wife and son survived only by hiding under their beds. After this, the house, already heavily guarded, was further fortified. Unknown to all, though, the eventual assassin had already inveigled his way into the household, posing as a businessman being converted to the cause. Although he was never fully trusted, his arrival at the house on the afternoon of August 20, with an article that he wanted Trotsky to look over, seemed innocuous enough. Trotsky invited him into the study and moments later the notorious ice pick (the blunt end), which had been concealed under the killer’s coat, smashed into Trotsky’s skull. He died some 24 hours later, in the hospital after an operation failed to save his life. The killer, who called himself Frank Jackson and claimed to be Belgian, served twenty years in jail, though he never explained his actions or even confessed to his true identity, Jaime Ramón Mercader del Río.

With its refreshing spring-like climate, CUERNAVACA has always provided a place of escape from Mexico City, but it isn’t always as refreshing as it claims to be. The state capital of Morelos, it is rapidly becoming industrialized, and the streets in the centre are permanently clogged with traffic and fumes. The gardens and villas that shelter the rich are almost all hidden away or in districts far from the centre, and many of them belong to narco-barons, whose rivalries brought a spate of violence in 2010. The spring of that year saw discotheques attacked and castrated corpses hung from bridges as deputies of a local kingpin fought for succession in the wake of his assassination by Mexican marines. The ensuing conflict left some fifty people dead, although the situation has calmed down somewhat since then.

The Aztecs called the city Cuauhnahuac (“place by the woods”), and it became a favourite resort and hunting ground for their rulers; the Spaniards corrupted the name to Cuernavaca (“cow horn”) simply because they couldn’t pronounce Cuauhnahuac. Hernán Cortés seized and destroyed the city during the siege of Tenochtitlán, then built himself a palace here. The palace-building trend has continued over the centuries: Emperor Maximilian and the deposed Shah of Iran both had houses here, and the inner suburbs are packed with the high-walled mansions of wealthy Mexicans and expats.

Though its popularity has waned in recent years, lucha libre , or wrestling, remains one of Mexico’s most avidly followed spectator sports. Over a dozen venues in the capital alone host fights several nights a week for a fanatical public. Widely available magazines, comics, photonovels and films recount the real and imagined lives of the rings’ heroes and villains, though the nightly telecasts are now a thing of the past.

Mexican wrestling is generally faster, with more complex moves, and more combatants in the ring at any one time than you would normally see in an American or British bout. This can make the action hard to follow for the uninitiated. More important, however, is the maintenance of stage personas, most of whom, heroes or villains, wear masks . The rudos tend to use brute force or indulge in sneaky, underhanded tactics to foil the opposition, while the técnicos use wit and guile to compensate for lack of brawn. This faux battle, not at all unlike WWE on-screen antics, requires a massive suspension of disbelief – crucial if you want to join in the fun.

One of the most bizarre features of wrestling was the emergence of wrestlers as political figures – typically still in costume. The most famous of these, Superbarrio , arose from the struggle of Mexico City’s tenant associations for fair rents and decent housing after the 1985 earthquake to become part of mainstream political opposition, even challenging government officials to step into the ring with him, and acting as a sort of unofficial cheerleader at opposition rallies.

The most famous wrestler of all time, however, was without doubt El Santo (“the Saint”). Immortalized in more than twenty movies, with titles such as El Santo vs the Vampire Women , he would fight, eat, drink and play the romantic lead without ever removing his mask, and until after his retirement, he never revealed his identity. His reputation as a gentleman in and out of the ring was legendary, and his death in 1984 widely mourned. His funeral was allegedly the second best-attended in Mexican history after that of President Obregón.

In Mexico City, fights can usually be seen on Tuesdays at the Arena Coliseo , Peru 77 (Metro Allende) and on Fridays at the Arena México , Dr Lucio 197 at Dr Lavista, Colonia Doctores (two blocks south and one east of Metro Balderas, but not a good area to be in at night). Tickets are sold on the door.

Paseo de la Reforma is the most impressive street in Mexico City, lined by tall, modern buildings. It was originally laid out in the 1860s by Emperor Maximilian to provide the city with a boulevard to rival the great European capitals, and doubled as a ceremonial drive from his palace in Chapultepec to the centre. It also provided a new impetus, and direction, for the growing metropolis. The original length of the broad avenue ran simply from the Bosque de Chapultepec to the junction of Juárez – at 5km a very long walk, but there are plenty of buses and peseros – and although it has been extended in both directions, this stretch is still what everyone thinks of as Reforma.

“Reforma Norte”, as the extension towards Guadalupe is known, is just as wide (and the traffic just as dense), but is almost a term of disparagement. Real Reforma, however, remains imposing – ten lanes of traffic, lines of trees, grand statues at every intersection and perhaps three or four of the original French-style, nineteenth-century houses still surviving. Twenty or thirty years ago it was the dynamic heart of the growing city, with even relatively new buildings being torn down to make way for yet newer, taller, more prestigious towers of steel and glass. The pulse has since moved elsewhere, and the fancy shops have relocated, leaving an avenue now mostly lined with airline offices, car rental agencies and banks, and somewhat diminishing the pleasure of a stroll.

The elegant colonial city of PUEBLA, the republic’s fifth-largest city (after Mexico City, Guadalajara, Monterrey and Tijuana), is an easy forty-minute trip from Tlaxcala, or a couple of hours by bus from Mexico City – with glorious views of the snowy heights of Popocatépetl and Ixtaccíhuatl on the way. Known for its fine cuisine, Puebla has a remarkable concentration of sights – a fabulous cathedral, a “hidden” convent, museums and colonial mansions – while the mountainous surrounding country is in places startlingly beautiful. The city centre and Cerro de Guadalupe, where all these sights are to be found, form quite a compact area, easy to get around, and you can see the best of the city and nearby Cholula in a couple of leisurely days, or even – at a brisk trot – in one packed day.

Military defeat seems to play a larger part in Puebla’s history than it does in most of Mexico – the city fell to the Americans in 1847 and to the French in 1863 – but that isn’t what’s remembered. Rather, what’s remembered and commemorated here is the greatest victory in the country’s history, at the Battle of Puebla in 1862, when a force of some two thousand Mexicans defeated a French army three times its size. The French were trying to make the Austrian prince Maxamilian emperor of Mexico, but when they tried to occupy Puebla, Mexican troops based in the two forts on the Cerro de Guadalupe (the Fuerte de Loreto and the Fuerte de Guadalupe) beat them off, forcing them to withdraw back towards their base at Veracruz and putting a serious dent into French plans. To this day, Puebla commemorates May 5 (Cinco de Mayo) with a massive fiesta, and there’s a public holiday throughout the country.

Fourteen kilometres north of Pachuca, draped across pine-clad hills, sits REAL DEL MONTE (aka Mineral del Monte), a once very wealthy silver-mining town, and, at over 2700m, a nice retreat from Mexico City. It’s a quietly appealing place where you can wander around the well-tended streets, and carefully explore mining relics in the surrounding hills. The town’s architecture is largely Spanish colonial, but is given an odd twist by the almost exclusive use of red corrugated-iron roofing, and the existence of Cornish-style cottages with their double-pitched rooflines.

As in much of Latin America, fútbol in Mexico is a national addiction, if not an obsession. Turn on the TV and often as not you’ll find a match. If you can get to see a live game, it’s a different experience entirely. For up-to-date information on Mexican league teams, fixtures and tables, visit futmex.com or futbolmexicano.net .

Football was introduced to Mexico in the nineteenth century by Cornish miners in Real del Monte, Hidalgo, and it was in that state, by descendants of those same Cornishmen, that Mexico’s first football club, Pachuca, was founded in 1901. The football league was created six years later. Mexico’s football league follows a complicated ladder system: the first division is divided into three tables of six teams each, which are decided by the previous season’s placings, with the league champions placed first in table one, second placed top of table two and so on. The top two teams of each table compete in a play-off for the league championship.

There are two seasons a year: Apertura (Aug–Nov) and Clausura (Jan–June). At the end of the Clausura season, the two seasons’ winners (if they are different) compete to decide that year’s champion of champions. Relegation to a lower division is decided over a two-season (yearly) loss average, so it is, in fact, technically possible to come first in the league and be relegated in the same season. However, relegation need not be the disaster that it might seem. Take, for example, Puebla C.F., who when relegated in 1999 simply bought the team promoted from Primera B (Curtodores), changed their name to Puebla and relocated them, which is perfectly legal under Mexican financial regulations. Similarly, there are no regulations preventing anyone from owning more than one team, which can lead to a clash of interests that are never more than speculated upon; suspicion of corruption is rife but rarely, if ever, investigated.

Matches are always exciting and enjoyed by even the most diehard “anti-futbolistas”. Music, dancing and, of course, the ubiquitous Mexican Wave make for a carnival atmosphere, enhanced by spectators dressing up and wearing face paint. They’re usually very much family affairs, with official salespeople bringing soft drinks, beer and various types of food at fixed prices to your seat. Stadiums tend to be mostly concrete, with sitting room only, and can sometimes be dangerously overcrowded, though accidents are thankfully rare.

The bigger clubs are those of Mexico City (América, Cruz Azul, Pumas – the national university side – Necaxa and Atlante) and Guadalajara (Chivas, Atlas and Tecos) and the games between any of these can draw crowds of up to eighty thousand, while smaller clubs like those of Puebla, Irapuato and Celaya may get no more than ten thousand or fifteen thousand spectators per game. The vast distances between clubs make travelling to away games impossible for many fans, one reason why smaller, more out-of-the-way clubs don’t get as much support. Opposing fans aren’t generally separated, but an atmosphere of self-policing prevails – making it an ideal family occasion. The greatest risk is often to the referee, who is frequently escorted from the pitch by armed riot police.

For national games the whole country is united, and football has many times been shown to rise above partisan politics. In 1999, despite being outlawed by the government, the EZLN football squad even played an exhibition match against the national side in Mexico City’s Estadio Azteca.

In 1824, a British firm took over the old silver mines in Real del Monte, which had first been opened by the Spanish in the mid-sixteenth century. Needing some mining expertise, the British brought over some 350 Cornish tin miners to help run the pits, but pulled out in 1848, to be replaced by a Mexican successor firm. Most of the tin miners stayed on however, and their legacy in Pachuca and Real del Monte lives on too, in the form of some surprisingly authentic Cornish pasties, and the introduction of fútbol (soccer), which was played for the first time on Mexican soil in Real del Monte. A plaque in the car park at the southern end of Hidalgo marks the spot where that first game was played, and it was this same Cornish community who went on to found Pachuca football club and the Mexican football league.

Silver has been mined in TAXCO since before the Conquest. Supplies of the metal have long been depleted, but it is still the basis of the town’s fame, as well as its livelihood, in the form of jewellery, which is made in hundreds of workshops here, and sold in an array of shops ( platerías ) catering mainly to tourists. The city is an attractive place, like some Mexican version of a Tuscan village, with a mass of terracotta-tiled, whitewashed houses lining narrow, cobbled alleys that straggle steeply uphill. At intervals the pattern is broken by a larger mansion, or by a courtyard filled with flowers or by the tower of a church rearing up; the twin spires of Santa Prisca , a Baroque wedding cake of a church in the centre of town, stand out above all.

Though it might seem a prosperous place now, Taxco’s development has not been entirely straightforward – indeed on more than one occasion the town has been all but abandoned. The Spaniards came running at the rumours of mineral wealth here (Cortés himself sent an expedition in 1522), but their success was short-lived, and it wasn’t until the eighteenth century that French immigrant José de la Borda struck it fabulously rich by discovering the San Ignacio vein. It was during Borda’s short lifetime that most of what you see originated – he spent an enormous sum on building the church of Santa Prisca, and more on other buildings and a royal lifestyle here and in Cuernavaca; by his death in 1778 the boom was already over. In 1929 however, the silver trade saw a revival, sparked by the arrival of American architect and writer William Spratling , who set up a jewellery workshop in Taxco, drawing on local traditional skills and pre-Hispanic designs. With the completion of a new road around the same time, a massive influx of tourists was inevitable – the town has handled it all fairly well, becoming rich at the expense of just a little charm.

The Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán was built on an island in the middle of a lake traversed by great causeways, a beautiful, strictly regulated, stone-built city of three hundred thousand residents. The Aztecs had arrived at the lake around 1325, after years of wandering and living off what they could scavenge or pillage from settled communities. According to legend, their patron god Huitzilopochtli had ordered them to build a city where they found an eagle perched on a nopal cactus, and devouring a snake. It is this legend that is the basis of the nopal, eagle and snake motif that forms the centrepiece of the modern Mexican flag.

The lake proved an ideal site: well stocked with fish, it was also fertile, once the Aztecs had constructed chinampas, or floating gardens of reeds. These enabled them to grow crops on the lake, as a result of which they were self-sufficient in food. The lake also made the city virtually impregnable: the causeways, when they were completed, could be flooded and the bridges raised to thwart attacks (or escape, as the Spanish found on the Noche Triste).

The island city eventually grew to cover an area of some thirteen square kilometres, much of it reclaimed from the lake, and from this base the Aztecs were able to begin their programme of expansion: initially dominating the valley by a series of strategic alliances, war and treachery, and finally, in a period of less than a hundred years before the brutal Spanish Conquest of 1521, establishing an empire that demanded tribute from, and traded with, the most distant parts of the country. Yet almost nothing of this amazing city survived the Conquest. “All that I saw then,” Bernal Díaz later wrote of his account of Tenochtitlán, “is overthrown and destroyed; nothing is left standing.” It is only relatively recently – particularly during construction of the Metro, and with the 1978 discovery of remains of the Templo Mayor beneath the colonial Zócalo – that a few remains of Tenochtitlán have been brought to light.

The city’s defeat, moreover, is still a harsh memory: Cortés himself is hardly revered, but the natives who assisted him, in particular La Malinche, the Veracruz woman who acted as Cortés’ interpreter, are non-people. Tributes to Moctezuma are rare, though Cuauhtémoc, his successor who led the fierce resistance, is commemorated everywhere; Malinche is represented, acidly, in some of Diego Rivera’s more outspoken murals.

Most visitors to Mexico City head out at some stage to the pre-Columbian pyramids at Teotihuacán: there’s a constant stream of tours, buses and cars heading this way, and the ruins can get quite busy, especially on a Sunday. As it’s an extensive site that can easily take up most of a day, it’s best, if possible, to head out here as early as you can manage and do most of your exploration in the cool of the morning, before the crowds arrive.

The ruins reveal a city planned and built on a massive scale, the great pyramids so huge that before their refurbishment one would have passed them by as hills without a second look. At its height this must have been the most imposing city in pre-Hispanic America, with a population thought to have been around 150,000 (though estimates vary), spread over an area of some 23 square kilometres (as opposed to the four square kilometres of the ceremonial centre). Back then, every building – grey hulks now – would have been covered in bright polychrome murals.

The main entrance, by Puerta 1, is at the southern end of the 2km-long Calzada de los Muertos (Causeway of the Dead), which originally extended 1.5km further south, and formed the axis around which the city developed. A broad roadway some 40m wide and linking all the most significant buildings, it was built to impress, with the low buildings that flank most of its length serving to heighten the impact of the two great pyramid temples at the northern end. Other streets, leading off to the rest of the city, originally intersected it at right angles, and even the Río San Juan was canalized so as not to disturb the symmetry (the bridge that then crossed it would have extended the full width of the street).

Its name is somewhat misleading, as it’s more a series of open plazas linked by staircases than a simple street. Neither is it in any way linked with the dead, although the Aztecs believed the buildings that lined it, then little more than earth-covered mounds, to be the burial places of kings. They are not, and although the exact function of most remains unclear, all obviously had some sacred significance. The design, seen in the many reconstructions, is fairly uniform: low three- or four-storey platforms consisting of vertical panels (tableros) supported by sloping walls. In many cases several are built on top of each other – clearly demonstrated in the Edificios Superpuestos (superimposed buildings) on the left-hand side shortly beyond the river. Here, excavated structures underneath the present level may have been the living quarters of Teotihuacán’s priests.

Directly opposite the entrance at Puerta 1 lies La Ciudadela, the Citadel. This enormous sunken square, surrounded by stepped platforms and with a low square altar in the centre, was the city’s administrative heart, with the houses of its chief priests and nobles arranged around a vast meeting place. Across the open space stands a tall pyramid construction inside which, during excavations, was found the Temple of Quetzalcoatl. With the back of the newer pyramid demolished, the elaborate (Miccaotli phase) temple structure stands revealed. Pyramids aside, this is one of the most impressive sections of the whole site, rising in four steps (of an original six), each sculpted in relief and punctuated at intervals by the stylized heads of Quetzalcoatl, the plumed serpent, and Tlaloc, the rain god. Traces of the original paint can be seen in places.

The great Pirámide del Sol (Pyramid of the Sun) is Teotihuacán’s outstanding landmark, a massive structure 70m high and, of Mexico’s ancient buildings, second in size only to Cholula (itself a total ruin). Its base is almost exactly the same size as that of the great Pyramid of Cheops in Egypt, but the lower-angled sides and its stepped nature make it very much lower. There are wonderful views from the top nonetheless, and the bulk is all the more remarkable when you consider the accuracy of its alignment: on two days a year (May 19 and July 25), the sun is directly over the pyramid at noon, and the main west facade faces the point at which the sun sets on these days. This alignment just off the cardinal points determined the line of the Calzada de los Muertos and of the entire city. Equally remarkable is the fact that the 2.5 million tonnes of stone and earth used in its construction were brought here without benefit of the wheel or any beast of burden, and shaped without the use of metal tools. The pyramid you see was reconstructed by Leopoldo Batres in 1908, in a thoroughly cavalier fashion. He blasted, with dynamite, a structure that originally abutted the south face, and stripped much of the surface in a search for a more complete building under the present one. In fact, the Pirámide del Sol, almost uniquely, was built in one go at a very early stage of the city’s development (about 100 AD), and there is only a very small older temple right at its heart.

You approach the pyramid by a short staircase leading to the right off the Calzada de los Muertos onto a broad esplanade, where stand the ruins of several small temples and priests’ dwellings. The main structure consists of five sloping layers of wall divided by terraces – the large flat area at the top would originally have ebeen surmounted by a sanctuary, long disappeared. Evidence of why this massive structure came to be raised here emerged in 1971 when archeologists stumbled on a tunnel (closed to the public) leading to a clover-leaf-shaped cave directly under the centre of the pyramid.

This, clearly, had been some kind of inner sanctuary, a holy of holies, and may even have been the reason for Teotihuacán’s foundation and the basis of its influence. Theories abound as to its exact nature, and many fit remarkably with legends handed down through the Aztecs. It’s most likely that the cave was formed by a subterranean spring, and came to be associated with Tlaloc, god of rain but also a bringer of fertility, as a sort of fountain of life. Alternatively, it could be associated with the legendary “seven grottoes”, a symbol of creation from which all later Mexican peoples claimed to have emerged, or to have been the site of an oracle, or associated with a cult of sacrifice – in Aztec times the flayed skins of victims of Xipe Totec were stored in a cave under a pyramid.

At the end of the Calzada de los Muertos rises the Pirámide de la Luna (Pyramid of the Moon), a smaller structure built slightly later (but still during the Tzacualli phase), whose top, thanks to the high ground on which it’s built, is virtually on a level with that of the Pirámide del Sol. The structure is very similar, with four sloping levels approached by a monumental stairway, but for some reason this seems a very much more elegant building: perhaps because of the smaller scale, or perhaps as a result of the approach, through the formally laid-out Plaza de la Luna. The top of the pyramid offers the best overview of the site’s layout, looking straight back down the length of the central thoroughfare. It is perfect for sunset, though as it is then close to closing time the guards will soon chase you down.

The Palacio de Quetzalpapálotl (Palace of the Quetzal-butterfly) lies to the left of the Plaza de la Luna, behind the low temples that surround it. Wholly restored, it’s virtually the only example of a pre-Hispanic roofed building in central Mexico and preserves a unique view of how the elite lived at Teotihuacán. The rooms are arranged around a patio whose elaborately carved pillars give the palace its name – their stylized designs represent birds (the brightly coloured quetzals, though some may be owls) and butterflies. In the galleries around the patio several frescoes survive, all very formalized and symbolic. Mural art was clearly very important in Teotihuacán, and almost every building has some decoration, though much has been removed for restoration.

Palacio de los Jaguares and Templo de los Caracoles Emplumados

Two earlier buildings, half-buried under the palace, still have substantial remains. In the Palacio de los Jaguares, jaguars in feathered headdresses blow conch shells from which emerge curls of music, or perhaps speech or prayers to Tlaloc (who appears along the top of the mural); in the Templo de los Caracoles Emplumados (Temple of the Plumed Snail Shells), you see a motif of feathers and seashells along with bright green parrots. Other murals, of which only traces remain, were found in the temples along the Calzada de los Muertos between the two pyramids.

Mural art was not reserved for the priests’ quarters – indeed some of the finest frescoes have been found in outlying apartment buildings. The famous Paradise of Tlaloc mural (reproduced in the Museo Nacional de Antropología) was discovered at Tepantitla, a residential quarter of the old city across the road from the back of the Pirámide del Sol. Only a part of it survives here, but there are others in the complex depicting a procession of priests and a ball-game. All have great vitality and an almost comic-strip quality, with speech bubbles emerging from the figures’ mouths, but their themes always have a religious rather than a purely decorative intent. More can be seen at Tetitla, to the west of the main site, and Atetelco, a little further west, just off the map.

Plan to spend at least some of your time in Teotihuacán’s excellent Museo del Sitio, situated behind the Pirámide del Sol and surrounded by a lovely sculpture and botanical garden. In the first room, artefacts from the site are well laid out and effectively lit to highlight the key features of each item in the cool interior. There’s just about everything you would expect of a ritual site and living city, from sharp-edged obsidian tools and everyday ceramics to some fine polychrome vessels decorated with animal and plant designs, and a series of five ceremonial braziers or censers ornamented with appliqué flowers, butterflies and shields.

Vast windows framing the Pirámide del Sol take up one entire wall of the second room, where you walk across a glass floor over a relief model of the entire city as it might once have been. The glass floor leads you to the third room, where burials from under the Temple of Quetzalcoatl have been relocated, along with statues of gods (often bottom-lit to accentuate the gruesome features), including a trio of braziers carried by the sun god Huitzilopochtli.

The rise and fall of Teotihuacán is almost exactly contemporary with imperial Rome. There is evidence of small agricultural communities in the vicinity dating to around 600 BC; by 200 BC a township had been established on the present site. From then until 1 AD (the period known as the Patlachique phase) the population increased, and the city assumed its most important characteristics: the great pyramids of the Sun and Moon were built, and the Calzada de los Muertos laid out. Development continued through the Tzacualli and Miccaotli phases (1–250 AD) with more construction and the blossoming of artistic expression. Then through the Tlamimilolpa phase (250–450 AD) there is evidence of the city’s influence (in architecture, sculpture and pottery) occurring at sites throughout modern Mexico and into Guatemala and Honduras. From 450 to around 650 AD (Xolalpan phase) it reached its peak in both population and power, with much new building and addition to earlier structures.

By the end of this period, however, there were already signs of decline, and the final phase, the Metepec, lasted at most a century before the city was sacked, burnt and virtually abandoned. This may have been the result of invasion or internal strife, but the underlying reasons could have been as much ecological as military. Vast forests were cut down to build the city (for use in columns, roof supports and door lintels) and huge quantities of wood burnt to make the lime plaster that coated the buildings. The result was severe soil erosion that left the hillsides as barren as they appear today. In addition, the agricultural effort needed to feed so many people (with no form of artificial fertilizer or knowledge of crop rotation) gradually sapped what land remained of its ability to grow more.

Whatever the precise causes, the city was left, eventually, to a ruination that was advanced even by the time of the Aztecs. To them, it represented a holy place from a previous age, and they gave it its present name, which translates as “the place where men became gods”. Although Teotihuacán features frequently in Aztec mythology, there are no written records – what we know of the city is derived entirely from archaeological and artistic evidence, so that even the original name remains unknown.

Allied to Cortés in his struggle against the Aztecs, as well as with colonial Spain in the War of Independence, TLAXCALA , the capital of a tiny state of the same name, has become a byword for treachery. Because of its alliance with Cortés, the town suffered a very different fate from that of nearby Cholula, which aligned itself with the Aztecs, and in the long run this has led to the disappearance of its ancient culture. The Spaniards founded a colonial town here – now restored and very beautiful in much of its original colonial glory, but whether because of its traitorous reputation or simply its isolation, development in Tlaxcala has been limited.

The town lies 131km west of Mexico City and 30km north of Puebla in the middle of a fertile, prosperous-looking upland plain surrounded by rather bare mountains. It’s an exceptionally pretty and much rehabilitated colonial town, comfortable enough but also fairly dull. Most of the interest lies very close to the zócalo, with its cluster of banks, post office and central bandstand, where the terracotta and ochre tones of the buildings lend the city its tag of “ Ciudad Roja ”, the Red City.

The capital of the state of México, TOLUCA DE LERDO is today a large and modern industrial centre, sprawling across a wide plain. At an altitude of nearly 2700m, it is the highest city in the country, and is surrounded by beautiful mountain scenery, dominated by the white-capped Nevado de Toluca . It is probably not a place you’ll want to linger, but on Fridays it is the site of what is allegedly the largest single market in the country.

Unusually for a Mexican city, Toluca’s centre is marked not by an open plaza, but by a central block surrounded on three sides by the nation’s longest series of arcades, built in the 1830s and known as portales , lined with shops, restaurants and cafés: Portal Madero is to the south along Hidalgo; Portal 20 de Noviembre is to the east along Allende; and Portal Reforma is to the west along Bravo. The fourth side is taken up by the nineteenth-century cathedral and, to its east, the mustard-yellow church of Santa Cruz . Most of the central sights are clustered north of the portales and the cathedral, close to the two massive open plazas: Plaza de los Mártires , north of the cathedral, which is dominated on its north side by the Palacio del Gobierno, and to its east, Plaza Garibay , which is rather prettier, with shrubbery and fountains.

The modern city of Tula de Allende lies on the edge of the Valley of México, 50km north of Mexico City. A pleasant enough regional centre with an impressive, if fortress-like, mid-sixteenth-century cathedral and Franciscan monastery, Tula is most notable for its wonderful pre-Hispanic pyramid site, located 2km north of the town centre.

Only a small part of Tula’s archeological site itself is of interest: though the city spreads over some considerable area only some of it has been excavated, and the outlying digs are holes in the ground, meaningful only to the archeologists who created them. The ceremonial centre, however, has been partly restored. The significance of the site is made much clearer if your Spanish is up to translating all the information presented in the museum by the entrance, and filled with fragments of Atlantes, Chac-mools and basalt heads, along with assorted bits of sculpture and frieze.

The site’s centrepiece is the low, five-stepped pyramid of the Templo de Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli (Temple of the Morning Star, or Pyramid B), atop which stand the Atlantes – giant, 5m-tall basalt figures that originally supported the roof of the sanctuary and represent Quetzalcoatl in his guise as the morning star, dressed as a Toltec warrior. The figures wear elaborately embroidered loincloths, sandals and feathered helmets, and sport ornaments around their necks and legs – for protection, each bears a sun-shaped shield on his back and a chest piece in the form of a stylized butterfly. Each also carries an atlatl, or spear-thrower, in his right hand and arrows or javelins in his left.

Other pillars are carved with more warriors and gods. Reliefs such as these are a recurrent theme in Tula: the entire temple was originally faced in sculpted stone, and although it was pillaged long ago you can still see some remnants – prowling jaguars and eagles, symbols of the two great warrior groups, devouring human hearts. In front of the temple is a great L-shaped colonnade, where the partly reconstructed pillars originally supported a huge roof under which, perhaps, the priests and nobles would review their troops or take part in ceremonies in the shade. Part of a long bench survives, with its relief decoration of a procession of warriors and priests. More such benches survive in the Palacio Quemado (Burnt Palace – it was destroyed by fire), next to the temple on the western side. Its three rooms, each a square, were once covered with a small central patio to let light in. The middle one is the best preserved, still with much of its original paint and two Chac-mools.

The main square of the city stood in front (south) of the temple and palace, with a low altar platform in the centre and the now ruinous pyramid of the Templo Mayor on the eastern side. The larger of two ball-courts in the central area is on the western side of the square: although also largely ruined, this marks one of the closest links between Tula and Chichén Itzá, as it is of identical shape and orientation to the great ball-court there. To the north of the temple stands the Coatepantli (Serpent Wall), elaborately carved in relief with images of human skeletons being eaten by giant snakes; beyond this, across an open space, there’s a second ball-court, smaller but in better order.

In legend at least, the mantle of Teotihuacán fell on Tollan, or Tula, as the next great power to dominate Mexico. The Aztecs regarded the city they constructed as the successor to Tula and hence embellished its reputation – the streets, they said, had been paved with gold and the buildings constructed from precious metals and stones, while the Toltecs, who founded Tula, were regarded as the inventors of every science and art. In reality, it seems unlikely that Tula was ever as large or as powerful a city as Teotihuacán had been – or as Tenochtitlán was to become – and its period of dominance (about 950–1150 AD) was relatively short. Yet all sorts of puzzles remain about the Toltec era, and in particular their apparent connection with the Yucatán – much of the architecture at Chichén Itzá, for example, appears to have been influenced by the Toltecs. Few people believe that the Toltecs actually had an empire that stretched so far: however warlike (and the artistic evidence is that Tula was a grimly militaristic society, heavily into human sacrifice), they would have lacked the manpower, resources or any logical justification for such expansion.

One possible answer lies in the legends of Quetzalcoatl. Adopted from Teotihuacán, the plumed serpent attained far more importance here in Tula, where he is depicted everywhere. At some stage Tula apparently had a ruler identified with Quetzalcoatl who was driven from the city by the machinations of the evil god Texcatlipoca, and the theory goes that this ruler, defeated in factional struggles within Tula, fled with his followers, eventually reaching Maya territory, where they established a new Toltec regime at Chichén Itzá. Though popular for a long time, this hypothesis has now fallen out of fashion following finds at Chichén Itzá that seem to undermine it.

West from Toluca, the road towards Morelia and the state of Michoacán is truly spectacular. Much of this wooded, mountainous area – as far as Zitácuaro – is given over to villas inhabited at weekends by wealthy refugees from the capital, and nowhere more so than at the small lakeside town of VALLE DE BRAVO. Set in a deep, pine-clad valley, the town sits on the eastern shore of an artificial lake, Lago Avandaro. With terracotta-tiled roofs, iron balconies affixed to many of the older buildings and a mass of whitewashed houses all huddled together, it is an immediately appealing place, something that has drawn a coterie of artistic refugees from the big city. They mostly keep to themselves, leaving the water’s edge for weekenders who descend for upmarket relaxation: boat trips, sailing, swimming, waterskiing, riding, paragliding, hiking and golf.

The zócalo, ringed with restaurants and centred on a twin-towered church, sits on a rise a fifteen-minute walk from the waterfront, where most of the action is centred, and sees spectacular sunsets. Here there’s a wharf ( embarcadero ) from which you can take boat rides to the parts of the lake inaccessible by road: either rent one, or join a lancha colectiva .

Valle de Bravo is a good base for visiting the Monarch Butterfly Sanctuary areas in the State of Mexico, which receive fewer visitors than those over the state line in Michoacán, and are more unspoilt, if less scenic. The easiest sanctuary area to visit from Valle de Bravo is at Los Saucos, whose gate is right on a main road and served by hourly buses between Valle de Bravo and Mexico City – make sure you get on a “por Saucos” bus. There are also organized tours every day in season, which can be booked through the tourist office or the tourist information kiosks in Valle de Bravo. Cerro Pelón, which is considered by many to be the prettiest of all the butterfly sanctuary areas, is slightly more remote, but can be reached on hourly Tepascelptepec-bound buses from Valle de Bravo.

The floating gardens adjoining the suburb of Xochimilco offer an intense carnival atmosphere every weekend and are likely to be one of your most memorable experiences of the city. Considerable effort has been expended in recent years to clean up the canals and maintain the water levels that had been dropping here, so Xochimilco (“place of the flower fields” in Náhuatl) looks set to remain the most popular Sunday outing for thousands of Mexicans. It’s also the one place where you get some feel for the ancient city and its water-borne commerce, thriving markets and dazzling colour – or at least an idealized view of it. Rent any of the colourful boats and you’ll be ferried around many kilometres of canals, continually harangued by women selling flowers, fruit and hot food from tiny canoes, or even by larger vessels bearing marimba players and entire mariachi bands who, for a small fee, will grapple alongside you and blast out a couple of numbers. The floating gardens themselves are no more floating than the Titanic : following the old Aztec methods of making the lake fertile, these chinampas are formed by a raft of mud and reeds, firmly rooted to the bottom by the plants. The scene now appears like a series of canals cut through dry land, but the area is still a very important gardening and flower-producing centre for the city. If you wander the streets of Xochimilco town you’ll find garden centres everywhere, with wonderful flowers and fruit in the market that enlivens the town centre for much of Saturday (though whether it’s healthy to eat food raised on these dirty waters is open to question).

Off the huge central plaza is the lovely sixteenth-century church of San Bernardino , full on Sundays with a succession of people paying homage and leaving offerings at one of its many chapels; in the plaza itself there are usually bands playing or mime artists entertaining the crowds.

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26 Best Things to Do in Mexico City, From Fine Art to Fine Dining and Shopping

From visiting museums to learning about tequila, these are the best things to do in Mexico City.

Mexico City is centuries old, and it would take at least that amount of time to experience all the culture, dining, arts, and hidden corners the city offers. The sprawling metropolis is home to more than 9 million residents living in more than 1,800 colonias, or neighborhoods.

Mexico City has recently seen a rise in visitors, who come to sip chocolate at La Rifa Chocolateria and shop the Avenida Presidente Masaryk. Travelers enjoy both historical sites and new additions, like modern restaurants and hotels. 

There's simply too much to see, taste, and experience, but we came up with some of the best things to do in Mexico City to kickstart your exploration.

See the Murals at Palacio de Bellas Artes

Construction on this iconic concert hall and arts center in Centro Histórico started in 1905, but the the Art Nouveau/Art Deco building wasn’t finished until 1934. The third floor displays 17 murals by seven prominent Mexican artists of the 20th century. One of the pieces, Diego Rivera’s Man at the Crossroads, is a recreation of an earlier version the famed muralist and revolutionary created for New York’s Rockefeller Center (before it was deemed it too controversial and destroyed ).

Indulge in Fine Dining at Pujol

Pujol , Enrique Olvera’s celebrated ode to Mexican gastronomy, tops most lists of the best restaurants in Mexico City. The seasonal tasting menu showcases the kitchen's modern take on traditional Mexican techniques and ingredients, including a signature mole aged for over 2,000 days.

People Watch in Parque México

This urban park is the green heartbeat of La Condesa. Its oval shape evokes the horse-racing track it replaced in 1927. The trees, fountains, and ample seating provide a perfect spot to catch one’s breath and people watch. Explore the manicured walking paths with an espresso or hot chocolate in hand.

Find Inspiration at the Frida Kahlo Museum

Stephanie Pollak/Travel + Leisure

La Casa Azul (the Blue House), in Coyoacán, easily spotted thanks to its striking cobalt shade, is where Mexican artist and revolutionary Frida Kahlo spent much of her life. Now a museum , the house displays some of her personal belongings, paintings, photographs, and dresses in a series of rooms and gardens.

Shop Handicrafts at Mercado de Artesanías La Ciudadela

Jorge Castro/Travel + Leisure

You don't have to travel to Oaxaca to find handicrafts and souvenirs made by local artisans. This market in Colonia Centro is the place to shop for ceramics, silver jewelry, wool blankets, and art handmade all over Mexico.

Wander Through Bosque de Chapultepec

At more than 1,600 acres, Bosque de Chapultepec is more than just a park. It houses a zoo, eight museums, a recreational lake, and monuments to Mexico's heroes. Don’t miss Chapultepec Castle, built in the 18 th century for the Spanish viceroy and now home to the National History Museum (pictured). Food vendors and street performers draw locals to the park on weekends.

Marvel at Museo Soumaya

The striking architecture is just part of what makes this jaw-dropping art museum one of the best things to do in Mexico City. The private collection holds more than 66,000 pieces with an estimated value of more than $700 million, but don't worry – admission is free.

Explore the Stacks at Biblioteca Vasconcelos

You might not initially include a library visit on a list of things to do in Mexico City, but Biblioteca Vasconcelos is an architectural marvel. The bookshelves are cantilevered out from the sides, giving them the appearance of floating from the ceiling. Smoked glass floors and multiple levels create an almost dizzying biblio-industrial aesthetic.

Chow Down at Churrería el Moro

Chewing on churros is easily one of the best things to do in Mexico City. While you'll find slightly stale (and cheaper) ones from street vendors, Churrería el Moro is an authentic stop for perfectly chewy churros, hot chocolate, and ice cream sandwiches. There are more than a dozen locations throughout the city, but the one in Centro Historico is the original and easiest to find.

Explore the Supernatural at Mercado Sonora

Mexico City is home to multiple markets, but Mercado Sonora is one of the few that sells occult products alongside piñatas, home goods, and fresh cacti. The rear of the market holds stalls dedicated to medicinal herbs, Santería statues, and Day of the Dead altar materials.

Visit Barrio Alameda

This Art Deco shopping and design center sits at the western edge of Alameda Central , the oldest public park in the Americas. It's one of the best places to go in Mexico City if you like visiting edgy boutiques and upscale restaurants. The rooftop patio is especially popular.

Order Seafood at Contramar

You might not think of landlocked Mexico City as a hotspot for seafood, but Contramar will confound your expectations. Creative takes on whole grilled fish and oysters abound.

Honor History at El Zócalo

Mexico City's Zócalo is one of the largest urban plazas in the world, and it occupies what had been the center of the ancient Aztec capital Tenochtitlan. Today, an enormous Mexican flag, which soldiers raise in a daily ceremony, marks the spot.

Stop by El Tizoncito for Tacos Al Pastor

This Condesa taqueria has some of the best tacos al pastor in Mexico City. Thinly-sliced and marinated pork is topped with raw onion, fresh cilantro, and slivers of sweet pineapple.

Listen to Music at Plaza Garibaldi

Plaza Garibaldi draws roving bands of Mariachi performers. Snag a spot at a nearby bar, order a tequila, and enjoy the show for the price of a song.

Take a Shot at the Museo del Tequila y Mezcal

Whether you choose a guided tour or wander among the tequila displays solo, there's a lot to learn about Mexico's most celebrated spirit at this museum . And yes, there's an onsite cantina where you can sample some for yourself.

Spot the Street Art

Mexico City is a respected art capital, but you don't have to visit a museum to see all of its masterpieces. The city's streets offer the opportunity to view an ever-changing showcase of murals and pieces, especially around Roma and Condesa.

Learn About the City's Ancient Origins at Templo Mayor

Templo Mayor was the primary worship site of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. Long thought lost after the destruction of the city by the Spanish in 1521, the remains of the temple were found next to the Metropolitan Cathedral and excavated from 1978 to 1982. Now, it's an archaeological site with an accompanying museum where visitors can view artifacts from the ancient structure and learn about its history.

Eat Something Unexpected at Quintonil

More than just a restaurant, Polanco's Quintonil is a gastronomic experience renowned for its ultra-modern Mexican cuisine with a traditional angle.

Experience the Zona Rosa Nightlife

The "pink zone" is one of the liveliest nightlife scenes in Mexico City, and it's particularly popular with the LGBTQ+ crowd. From karaoke bars to cocktail lounges to dancing, there's something for everyone.

Appreciate Indigenous History at Museo Nacional de Antropología

History enthusiasts will love this museum 's collection of Indigenous artifacts (the largest in Mexico) spread across multiple galleries and outdoor gardens. Don't miss the Sun Stone, an intricate ( and mysterious ) Aztec solar disk, in the Mexicas room.

Pick Up a Luxury Souvenir on Avenida Presidente Masaryk

Running through the middle of Polanco, Avenida Presidente Masaryk is one of the most expensive streets in the world, comparable to glitzy thoroughfares like New York's Fifth Avenue and Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. Here you’ll find luxury stores like Louis Vuitton and Cartier, as well as great restaurants, bars, and cafés.  

See What’s Blooming at Mercado de Jamaica 

This market in Venustiano Carranza stands out from others around Mexico City for its abundant bouquets of colorful flowers. Pick up a custom arrangement or just snap a pic in front of the pink and gold bursts of Mexican marigolds while breathing in the scent of 5,000 varieties of flowers and ornamental plants.  

Marvel at the Lobby of the Gran Hotel Ciudad de México

Julius Reque  / Getty Images

You don't have to make a reservation to appreciate the Gran Hotel Ciudad de México . Stop in to see the ornate Art Nouveau architecture, which includes an immense and elaborate stained-glass ceiling by French artisan Jacques Grüber. Come for the beautiful lobby and stay for a drink at La Terraza, the rooftop bar overlooking the Zócalo.

Satisfy Your Sweet Tooth at La Rifa Chocolateria

You’ll find plenty of chocolate shops in Mexico City, but we recommend heading straight to La Rifa in Juárez. Ingredients are locally and ethically sourced ,with the cacao beans coming from farms in Chiapas and Tabasco. La Rifa's frothy, brewed chocolate drinks can be infused with flavors like cardamom and honey.   

Glide Past the Floating Gardens of Xochimilco

About a 45-minute drive south from Centro, Xochimilco is home to a historic system of canals and lakes that once connected most of the settlements in the Valley of Mexico. Rent a colorful  trajinera at one of the embarcaderos (docks) and make your way around the UNESCO World Heritage Site . Pick up some pulque and elotes out on the water from one of the many floating vendors. 

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Mexico Travel Guide

Last Updated: November 10, 2023

While most people visit Mexico for its big tourist centers like Tulum , Cabo, Cancun , or Cozumel, there’s a lot more to the country than just its luxurious resorts.

Now, I’ll be honest: I was late to visiting Mexico.

But when I did, I fell in love with it. Mexico is an incredible destination with a rich history, amazing food, and friendly people.

It’s an awesome country to backpack around, drive through, or just vacation in. There’s a ton of stuff to do here, and the locals are some of the friendliest people on the planet.

From Mayan ruins to pristine beaches to Mexico City’s art and food and Oaxaca’s mezcal scene, Mexico has it all.

And the food? World-class. Gorge yourself on delicious tacos, tostadas, tamales, sopas, seafood, and mole (to name a few items from Mexico’s very long list of traditional dishes).

I could go on forever as to why I love this country. Whatever amount of time you’re planning to visit is not enough — you’ll always leave wanting more.

This Mexico travel guide will help you get out of the touristy towns, explore the country, and fall in love with what you discover!

Table of Contents

• Things to See and Do
• Typical Costs
• Suggested Budget
• Money-Saving Tips
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• How to Stay Safe
• Best Places to Book Your Trip
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Top 5 things to see and do in mexico.

1. Explore Oaxaca

Located in a valley surrounded by craggy mountains in southwestern Mexico, Oaxaca and its surrounds have been inhabited for thousands of years by indigenous Zapotec and Mixtec peoples. A city of colorful buildings, scenic rooftop restaurants and bars, street art, historic Spanish colonial churches, cobblestone streets, and many parks, it’s a center for heritage tourism. It’s also one of the gastronomic hotbeds of Mexico as well as the hub of mezcal production too. With fascinating museums, bustling markets, historic buildings, delicious food and much more, there really is something for everyone in Oaxaca . I loved my time there ! You must visit!

2. Tour Mexico City

Found in the Valley of Mexico at an altitude of around 2,225 meters (7,300 feet), Mexico City is a sprawling, chaotic, messy city in the best way possible. Originally built over a lake, it has some 150 world-class museums, sprawling markets, tons of historic buildings, city squares, and more. In the historic center, you can visit the impressive main square (the only one bigger in the world is Red Square in Moscow). To the south of the city there’s a network of beautiful canals, and Teotihuacan, the City of the Gods, is just a 45-minute drive away. The city also has an incredible foodie scene and is fast becoming one of the centers of gastronomy in the world.

3. Relax on the Pacific Coast

Vacation spots like Puerto Vallarta, Los Cabos, and Sayulita on Mexico’s Pacific Coast offer just as many epic beaches and resort properties as the Caribbean Coast. Go to Puerto Vallarta or Los Cabos to hang out on the pristine white sandy beaches, or head to Sayulita to check out the busy surf scene. Surf and enjoy watersports, visit historical monuments, and check out all the local art by day. By night, you can indulge in sunset cocktails, enjoy fresh shrimp tacos or seafood skewers, and salsa the evening away.

4. See the Mayan Ruins

Mexico is filled with ruins. You have Chichén Itzá, which dates back to 550 CE and is one of the largest (and most popular) Mayan sites in Mexico for its enormous Kukulkan Pyramid (which is considered one of the new Wonders of the World). Other ruins worth visiting are the Tulum Archaeological Zone, the Palenque Archaeological Zone, the Calakmul ruins (which are inside the huge Calakmul Biosphere Reserve), the ruins at Ek Balam, and so many more! Admission is 571 MXN for the Wonder of the World Chichén Itzá while the rest cost anywhere from 80-500 MXN.

5. Visit a volcano

Other things to see and do in mexico, 1. wander through mexico city’s chapultepec park.

Chapultepec is one of the largest city parks in the world, spanning over 1,700 acres. It encompasses the Mexico City Zoo, La Feria amusement park, and the Museum of Anthropology, which houses a vast collection of sculptures, jewels, and artifacts from ancient Mexican civilizations. The museum costs 85 MXN, as does the Chapultepec Castillo (Castle) which houses the National History Museum. You can also rent a rowboat or paddle boat and go out on Chapultepec Lake for 60 MXN. Entry to the park itself is free.

2. Visit the markets

Just about every town in Mexico has a busy, diverse market where you can enjoy traditional food, pick up some bargain items, and purchase souvenirs. Two of the best are the Mercado Ciudadela in Mexico City (for handmade textiles and artwork), and Oaxaca’s Mercado Benito Juárez (for local foods like fresh ground coffee beans, juices, and grasshopper tacos). If you’re in Merida, check out Mercado Santa Ana for their Yucatecan cuisine, like cochito horneado , a marinated pork dish that is slow-cooked in underground pits, or head to El Mercado Lucas de Galvez for their specialty seafood cocktails (the locals swear by it to cure your hangover).

3. Explore Zócalo (Plaza de la Constitución)

Zócalo is the main plaza in the heart of Mexico City. It dates back to the Aztecs, encompassing both the Templo Mayor (an ancient Aztec temple) and the Palacio Nacional (a colonial palace with offices of Mexico’s president). Situated just off the Zócalo is La Catedral Metropolitana, a magnificent cathedral with a gold altar. It’s a perfect example of Spanish colonial architecture.

4. Go diving

The seas surrounding Mexico have some of the world’s best diving spots thanks to their diverse marine life, large coral reefs (including the second largest reef system in the world, the Great Maya Barrier Reef), and excellent visibility. The Gulf of Mexico is home to five different species of sea turtles, blue whales, lemon sharks, and dolphins, and so much more! Aside from diving, the waters are popular for snorkeling, sports fishing, waterboarding, surfing, and more or less any other watersports. A two-tank dive starts at 2,800 MXN. Some of the best places to dive in Mexico are Discovery Bay, Cenote Dos Ojos, Revillagigedo Islands, and Isla Mujeres.

5. Relax in Cancún

Depending on what you’re looking to do, Cancún can offer you a crazy-fun party in the sun or some quiet and hidden local markets and restaurants. You have spas, resorts, and picturesque beaches as well as Mayan ruins, archaeological sites, and little nearby villages. There’s a ton to see and do here if you leave the resorts!

6. Get lost in Guadalajara

Guadalajara is the second-largest city in Mexico and is known for its tequila and mariachi. It’s chock full of museums, such as Cabañas (a UNESCO building with incredible murals), MUSA (paintings & sculptures by local artists), and the Páramo Galeria (contemporary art); nightlife venues, and a labyrinth of old colonial streets. Visit the Hospicio Cabañas, a hospital built in the 19th century, and then spend some time at the Guadalajara Cathedral. The cathedral’s Gothic interior features artworks from famous Mexican artists like Murillo (a Baroque painter).

7. See Teotihuacan

The Aztec empire left an enormous mark on Mexico. Don’t miss the awe-inspiring Aztec pyramids at Teotihuacan, located 48 kilometers (30 miles) outside of Mexico City. Teotihuacan was founded as early as 400 BCE, but its biggest structures weren’t completed until around 300 BCE. Its three giant pyramids are known as the Temple of the Sun, the Temple of Moon, and the Temple of the Feathered Serpent, and they dominate the landscape. If you’re going to visit just one Aztec site, this is it. It’s unsheltered here, so bring sunscreen and a hat. Admission is 85 MXN. Full-day guided tours from Mexico City cost 880 MXN.

8. Visit the bizarre Island of Dolls

Known as “La Isla de la Muñecas” in Spanish, this is perhaps one of the creepiest tourist attractions in the world. Decades ago, a hermit named Don Julian Santana moved here, learned a girl drowned in the nearby lake, and started collecting and hanging dolls all over the island to please the drowned girl’s spirit. It’s creepy. Like beyond creepy. You’ll have to hire a boat from Xochimilco to get there but it’s worth it!

9. Honor the Day of the Dead

Yearly on November 1st and 2nd, Mexico celebrates a major festival: Día de Los Muertos. The festival is a vibrant and lively affair with celebrations for those who are gone but not forgotten, including parades and elaborate and colorful costumes. Families also commemorate their dead relatives by setting up ofrendas , or altars, with pictures of the deceased, candles, yellow marigold petals, and food. This meant to encourage the deceased to cross back over into the land of the living and join in the celebrations. Oaxaca or Mexico City are the two best places to experience this celebration.

10. Visit the UNAM Botanical Garden

If you need to escape the hustle and bustle of Mexico City for a little while, the Botanical Garden at the National Autonomous University of Mexico is the perfect place. Keeping with the Aztec traditions of having gardens for both medicinal and ornamental purposes, there is also an added focus on conservation and environmental education here. Built on top of and around lava formations from the eruption of the volcano Xitle (which happened over 2,000 years ago), visitors can explore the naturally formed grottoes, ponds, and waterfalls. This garden has the most diverse cactus collection in the world (800 different kinds!), and ponds full of koi and turtles, an orchidarium, and a medicinal garden. Admission is free.

11. Relax on Isla Holbox

Holbox is an island located off Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula and is home to white sand beaches and crystalline waters. It is a relaxing, slow-paced island that’s easy to get stuck on. One day can easily turn into a week. It’s an island paradise where you can relax in a hammock on the beach, hike in the jungles, swim, dive, snorkel, and everything in between! While it used to be a hidden gem, it’s slowly becoming more and more popular (and developed). Be sure to see bioluminescent waters here. From Cancún, you can get to the ferry port at Chiquilá in around two hours by bus. The ferry takes 25 minutes and costs 220 MXN. If you just want to visit for the day, full-day tours from Cancún/Playa del Carmen cost 3,000 MXN.

12. Visit Mérida

Mérida is one of my favorite places in all of Mexico. It is a safe and wonderful city filled with history, cool mezcal bars, and some of the best food in the country. Some of my favorite places to eat and drink in town are La Chaya Maya Casona, Acervo Mezcalero, La Negrita Cantina, and Café Créme. Also, don’t miss the nearby Uxmal ruins, which are just one-hour away. There are also some cool museums here, like the Folk Art Museum of Yucatan, the Yucatan Music Museum, and the City Museum (which has all kinds of Mayan artifacts).

13. Enjoy San Cristóbal de las Casas’ architecture

San Cristóbal is a highland town known for its charming colonial architecture. There are narrow cobblestone streets, local craft markets, and the entire area is enveloped in pine forests. Don’t miss the town’s 16th-century cathedral, and if you want to get out and explore the nearby nature, take a boat tour of the Cañón de Sumidero. You’ll see tons of birds, monkeys, and crocodiles. For a view of the town and surrounding area, visit the Guadalupe Church to enjoy the view from the roof. Free Walking San Cristóbal offers daily tours if you want a guide to show you the highlights.

14. Sample the Cenotes of Yucatan

Cenotes are natural sinkholes that are full of groundwater. They were used by the Mayans as sources for freshwater, however, today they are popular swimming holes for locals and tourists alike (you can even scuba dive in some). There are tons of them all around the Yucatan Peninsula. Some are completely exposed, some are walled in by cliffs, and some are covered entirely by caves. Calavera, Cristalino, Casa Cenote, Yaxmuul, Choo-Ha, and Escondido Cenote are some of the most popular cenotes in the region. If you’d rather do a tour, you can join a cenote tour for around 1,350 MXN.

15. Visit Sayulita

Located on the Pacific coast, Sayulita is a hip beach town with a lively community of expats and surfers. The town has a laid-back vibe owing to the sizable surfing and yoga community. It’s a great place to surf and there are plenty of yoga retreats available here. You can also take a jungle trek, go zip lining, ride ATVs along the coast, and simply soak up the sun on the beach. It’s the perfect place to chill for a few days. Canopy tours start at 1,800 MXN.

16. Explore Campeche

Campeche is located just south of Merida on the Yucatan. It’s home to UNESCO World Heritage colonial architecture, including fortified walls and over 2,000 historic buildings. Visit the Museo De La Arquitectura Maya for Mayan history and antiquities, see the Mayan ruins at Edzná (which is just 45 minutes away and sees very few tourists), and wander the old city wall to take in the view.

  For information on specific cities in Mexico, check out these guides:

• Cancún Travel Guide
• Mexico City Travel Guide
• Oaxaca Travel Guide

Mexico Travel Costs

Accommodation – In Mexico, hostels start at 250 MXN per night for a dorm bed, but average closer to 300 MXN. Private hostel rooms cost anything from 600-1,900 MXN per night. Prices are usually a bit lower in the low-season or shoulder-season. Free Wi-Fi and free breakfast are both common, as are self-catering facilities.

For those traveling with a tent, a basic plot for two people without electricity costs around 200 MXN per night.

For budget hotels, expect to pay 700 MXN for a basic room in a two-star hotel. These two-star rooms typically include an en-suite bathroom and free Wi-Fi, but not always air conditioning.

Airbnb is also an option in Mexico, with private rooms starting around 300 MXN but averaging much more (usually between 600-1,200 MXN). Entire homes and apartments average around 1,000-1,800 MXN although you can find them for as little as 600 MXN if you book early.

Food – You’ll find a lot of rice, beans, fruits, and veggies like tomatoes, corn, avocado, and peppers in Mexican cuisine, which is a mix of Mayan, Aztec, and Spanish traditions. Typical Mexican dishes include tacos, mole (a sauce with lots of ingredients, often including chocolate), salsa, enchiladas, tamales (stuffed corn pockets), pozole (hominy stew topped with onion, avocado, and chili), and guacamole.

Street stalls and markets are the best way to go for authentic and inexpensive food. Tacos, quesadilla, sopas, tortas, and other street foods are generally 15-45 MXN. Sometimes, you’ll find tacos for as cheap as 10 MXN. In Mexico, street food is the best — and most affordable — option.

A meal at a local Mexican restaurant serving traditional cuisine costs around 150 MXN. Look for the ones filled with locals as that is generally a sign that the food is really good. Expect to pay around 300 MXN for a multi-course meal in a mid-range restaurant.

A beer is about 20 MXN in the street but double that at a restaurant, while a cocktail shouldn’t cost more than 80 MXN in most places. A combo meal at McDonald’s costs around 120 MXN and a cappuccino costs around 50 MXN.

Tap water is not safe to drink in Mexico. If you’re buying bottles of water, expect to pay 15 MXN (less if you buy in bulk but a more environmentally friendly (and cheaper) solution is to bring a portable water purifier ( LifeStraw makes a good one.

If you plan to cook your meals, expect to pay between 750 MXN per week for groceries including rice, vegetables, chicken, and beans.

Backpacking Mexico Suggested Budgets

If you’re backpacking Mexico, expect to spend around 800 MXN per day. This budget gets you a hostel dorm, street food and self-cooked meals, public transportation, and a few attractions (such as museums and galleries) each day. If you plan on eating out more or drinking, you’ll need to add another 100 MXN per day.

On a mid-range budget of about 1,800 MXN per day, you can stay in a private hostel room or Airbnb, eat out at restaurants serving cheap traditional cuisine for every meal, visit more attractions, enjoy a few drinks, and take the occasional taxi to get around.

On a “luxury” budget of 3,600 MXN or more per day, you can stay at a hotel, eat out for all your meals, enjoy plenty of drinks, take taxis everywhere or rent a car, and do some guided trips and tours. This is just the ground floor for luxury though. The sky is the limit!

You can use the chart below to get some idea of how much you need to budget daily, depending on your travel style. Keep in mind these are daily averages — some days you’ll spend more, some days you’ll spend less (you might spend less every day). We just want to give you a general idea of how to make your budget. Prices are in MXN.

Mexico Travel Guide: Money-Saving Tips

Mexico is incredibly budget-friendly. Unless you’re splurging on food or resorts, it’s really easy to visit on a budget. That said, it never hurts to save more money! Here are some ways to save in Mexico:

• Shop at the markets for food – Mexico’s markets are a great place to eat inexpensively and stock up on food for day trips. Most towns have a local market selling fresh fruits, veggies, and other goods for cheap.
• Eat street food – Street food is the best food in the country — and the cheapest. Stick to street stalls to save money and enjoy the country’s best eats.
• Take a free walking tour – Many cities have free walking tours that give you a solid introduction to the main sights. Both Mexico City and Oaxaca have excellent free tours — just be sure to tip your guide!
• Travel off-season – By traveling between late April and early December, you can pick up bargain accommodation, food and travel rates as this is low season.
• Venture inland – Mexico’s coasts are the most famous, most touristy parts of the country, but the interior has an amazing amount to offer. Prices are cheaper, and you’ll be more likely to meet some locals if you head away from the coast.
• Stay with a local – Use Couchsurfing to stay with locals and connect with people who can share their insider tips and advice. Just make sure to send your requests early.
• Embrace “comida corrida” – This hearty mid-day meal option is usually available between 2pm-4pm and is often quite affordable. It’s a set menu, but it’s much cheaper than most lunch or dinner options. If you plan on eating out on a budget, aim for places that offer comida corrida.
• Drink less – Alcohol is cheap in Mexico, but it’s definitely more expensive at bars and clubs. Try to buy your alcohol from a local store instead of drinking at the bar if you’re on a budget.
• Skip the taxis – Taxis are overpriced and not always safe. Skip them. If you do need a taxi, don’t just hail one on the street. Head into a nearby hotel/hostel and ask them to call one for you. Only get in taxis that use a meter.
• Being a water filter – Since the tap water here isn’t safe to drink and single-use plastic is bad for the environment, bring a water bottle with a built-in filter. LifeStraw makes reusable bottles with a built-in filter so you can ensure your water is always clean and safe.

Where to Stay in Mexico

Hostels are plentiful in most of Mexico’s cities. Here are some of my favorite places to stay in Mexico:

• Suites DF Hostel (Mexico City)
• Mexico City Hostel (Mexico City)
• Hostel Ka’beh Cancún (Cancún)
• Mama’s Home (Tulum)
• Gran Hostal (Playa del Carmen)
• Casa Angel Youth Hostel (Oaxaca)

How to Get Around Mexico

Public transportation – Public buses (also known as camiones ) are the most common way to get around in cities and towns (and to nearby villages). These buses are also the cheapest, costing no more than a few pesos per journey. In some cities, smaller microbuses have replaced the older buses, but the cost is still the same.

Mexico City and Guadalajara have subway systems. One-way tickets for the subway and the bus system are around 5 MXN. In Mexico City, you’ll have to buy a rechargeable Metro Card at any of the Metro stations for 15 MXN, and you can use the card for the Metro, Metrobús, Light Rail, Ecobici, Trolleybus, RTP buses, and on Cablebús.

Bus – Most of Mexico is served by buses. On longer journeys, make sure to take an express bus (called a “directo”) if you can as they are much faster and stop less. A bus from Puerto Vallarta to Guadalajara (5.5 hours) costs around 585 MXN. A bus from Cancún to Mexico City (27 hours) costs around 1,800 MXN. A bus from Puebla to Mexico City (2 hours) costs around 200 MXN.

Some of the biggest and most reliable bus companies include:

• Primera Plus
• Estrella de Oro
• Omnibuses de Mexico
• ETN (Enlaces Terrestres Nacionales)

Most cities have a central bus terminal from where all long-distance buses depart. You can show up to buy your ticket, or research routes and ticket prices via each company’s website.

To find bus routes and prices, use BusBud .

Train – There are virtually no passenger train services remaining in Mexico. For long-distance travel, you’ll need to fly or take the bus.

Flying – For long journeys, consider flying. The route from Cancún to Mexico City by bus takes 27 hours and costs around 1,800 MXN but a flight starts around 470 MXN and only takes two hours. A one-way fare from Mexico City to Guadalajara is about 525 MXN. Even a four-hour flight from coast to coast from Cancún to Puerto Vallarta is just 1,200 MXN one-way.

Aeroméxico is the biggest airline in Mexico, but low-cost carriers are becoming more popular. These include:

• VivaAerobus

Car rentals – Car rentals are surprisingly affordable in Mexico. You can find week-long rentals for around 3,000 MXN. Renters must be 21 years of age and have had their license for at least two years. Some companies require renters to be over 25 and it’s best to carry an International Driving Permit (IDP). Avoid driving at night, when crimes against drivers are more likely to occur. Also, don’t leave any valuables in your vehicle overnight as break-ins can occur.

For the best car rental prices, use Discover Cars .

When to Go to Mexico

Summer (June to October) is the rainy season in Mexico, but this is mostly just in the center of the country. You can expect it to rain each day heavily, but the downpour is usually short. It hardly ever rains in the northern part of the country, and humidity is thick in the south and along the coastal areas. Temperatures during this time hover somewhere between 26-32°C (79-90°F).

September to the middle of October is hurricane season and is not a good time to visit.

December to the end of April (winter) is the busiest tourist season as temperatures are hot, but the coastal areas provide plenty of relief for vacationers. This is the best time to visit if you’re looking to take advantage of Mexico’s tropical environment. It’s the dry season, so you’ll experience very little rain. You can expect big crowds as people flock to the resort areas around Cancún and Puerto Vallarta.

The average daily temperature during this time is 28°C (82°F). But if you’re in the mountains, pack lots of layers! It can get frigid, especially in the evenings.

How to Stay Safe in Mexico

The media (especially the American media) likes to paint Mexico as a dangerous place to visit but the reality is far more complex. While petty theft is very common in Mexico, most of the serious conflicts occur between the authorities and Mexican drug cartels. The people who tend to be involved in major incidents are usually doing drugs or taking part in sex tourism. Avoid those, and you’ll drastically increase your chances of staying safe.

Moreover, where you are greatly influences how safe you are. Yucatan and Oaxaca are incredibly safe states to visit while states near the US border are less so and more likely to experience violence and crime.

Officials looking for bribes are pretty common in Quintana Roo, as is drug-related violence due to tourists looking for drugs there. States near the southern border can also be sketchy and it’s wiser to keep an eye out on your stuff there though violent crime is pretty uncommon.

So don’t believe the media that “Mexico is unsafe.” Mexico is like any big country – some parts are safe, and some parts aren’t. Use some common sense when you travel: don’t flash your money, avoid wearing expensive watches or jewelry, don’t walk along drunk at night, make copies of your passport and official documents, and tell people where you are regularly.

Another important safety tip to keep in mind is about the water. While Mexico’s water purification and treatment systems have improved, it still is not safe to drink ordinary tap water when visiting. Luckily, bottled water is available everywhere. Bringing water filter like LifeStraw is advised as it has a built-in filter so your water is always clean and safe.

Keep an eye out for common scams against tourists , such as fake ATMs, taxis that don’t use a meter, and questionable tour operators.

The emergency services number in Mexico is 911. However, if that doesn’t work (since it isn’t in use in every region of Mexico), try 066.

The most important piece of advice I can offer is to purchase good travel insurance. Travel insurance protects you against illness, injury, theft, and cancellations. It’s comprehensive protection in case anything goes wrong. I never go on a trip without it as I’ve had to use it many times in the past.

Mexico Travel Guide: The Best Booking Resources

These are my favorite companies to use when I travel. They consistently have the best deals, offer world-class customer service and great value, and overall, are better than their competitors. They are the companies I use the most and are always the starting point in my search for travel deals.

• Skyscanner – Skyscanner is my favorite flight search engine. They search small websites and budget airlines that larger search sites tend to miss. They are hands down the number one place to start.
• Hostelworld – This is the best hostel accommodation site out there with the largest inventory, best search interface, and widest availability.
• Booking.com – The best all around booking site that constantly provides the cheapest and lowest rates. They have the widest selection of budget accommodation. In all my tests, they’ve always had the cheapest rates out of all the booking websites.
• Get Your Guide – Get Your Guide is a huge online marketplace for tours and excursions. They have tons of tour options available in cities all around the world, including everything from cooking classes, walking tours, street art lessons, and more!
• SafetyWing – Safety Wing offers convenient and affordable plans tailored to digital nomads and long-term travelers. They have cheap monthly plans, great customer service, and an easy-to-use claims process that makes it perfect for those on the road.
• LifeStraw – My go-to company for reusable water bottles with built-in filters so you can ensure your drinking water is always clean and safe.
• Unbound Merino – They make lightweight, durable, easy-to-clean travel clothing.
• Top Travel Credit Cards – Points are the best way to cut down travel expenses. Here’s my favorite point earning credit cards so you can get free travel!

Mexico Travel Guide: Related Articles

Want more info? Check out all the articles I’ve written on backpacking/traveling Mexico and continue planning your trip:

The 20 Best Things to Do in Mexico City

The 5 Best Hotels in Oaxaca

Where to Stay in Oaxaca: The Best Neighborhoods for Your Visit

How to Spend 5 Days in Oaxaca

The 15 Best Things to Do in Oaxaca

Is Tulum Safe?

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• Where To Stay
• Transportation
• Booking Resources
• Related Blogs

Passing Thru Travel

Ultimate Cancún Adventure: Your 15-Step Guide to Mexico’s Coastal Gem

Posted: February 29, 2024 | Last updated: February 29, 2024

Cancún, Mexico’s vibrant coastal city, is a destination where ancient history meets modern luxury and natural beauty. Known for its stunning Caribbean beaches, rich Mayan heritage, and dynamic nightlife, Cancún caters to all kinds of travelers. From the adventurous soul seeking to explore underwater wonders to the history enthusiast intrigued by ancient civilizations, this city has something for everyone. This guide will take you through the best of Cancún, offering tips to make your visit truly unforgettable.

1. Stunning Beaches of Cancún

The beaches in Cancún are the city’s crowning glory, boasting powdery white sand and crystal-clear turquoise waters. Playa Delfines is known for its serene beauty and is a great spot for surfing. Playa Tortugas offers calm waters and plenty of amenities for a more family-friendly beach day. Each beach has its unique charm and offers various activities, from jet-skiing to simply lounging under the sun.

Insider’s Tip: Visit the beaches early in the morning to avoid the crowds and experience a tranquil sunrise.

How To Get There: Most beaches in Cancún are easily accessible by bus or taxi from the hotel zone.

Best Time To Travel: The best time to visit the beaches is from December to April, when the weather is sunny and less humid.

2. Underwater Museum (MUSA)

The Cancún Underwater Museum (MUSA) offers a unique blend of art and marine life. This underwater spectacle features over 500 sculptures by Jason deCaires Taylor and other artists, all designed to promote coral life. Diving or snorkeling around these life-size statues is a surreal experience, giving you a glimpse into a fascinating underwater world.

Insider’s Tip: Opt for a glass-bottom boat tour if you’re not keen on diving or snorkeling.

How To Get There: MUSA can be accessed by boat from Cancún’s hotel zone. Most tours to the museum include transportation.

Best Time To Travel: Visit between May and September for the best underwater visibility.

3. Exploring Mayan Ruins: Chichen Itza and Tulum

No trip to Cancún is complete without exploring the nearby Mayan ruins. Chichen Itza, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the World’s New Seven Wonders, is just a couple of hours away. Here, the iconic El Castillo pyramid takes center stage. Closer to Cancún, the Tulum ruins offer a breathtaking mix of history and natural beauty, with structures perched atop cliffs overlooking the Caribbean Sea.

Insider’s Tip: Hire a certified guide at the sites to gain deeper insight into Mayan history and culture.

How To Get There: Organized tours are available from Cancún, or you can drive or take a bus to both sites.

Best Time To Travel: Visit during the early morning or late afternoon to avoid the heat and crowds.

4. Cenote Diving and Swimming

Cenotes, natural freshwater sinkholes, are quintessential to the Yucatan Peninsula. These geological formations offer a unique swimming, snorkeling, or diving experience. Some of the most famous cenotes near Cancún include Cenote Dos Ojos, known for its crystal-clear waters and stunning rock formations, and Gran Cenote, perfect for families and snorkeling enthusiasts.

Insider’s Tip: Bring biodegradable sunscreen to protect the delicate ecosystem of the cenotes.

How To Get There: Cenotes are accessible by car or organized tours from Cancún.

Best Time To Travel: Visit cenotes year-round, but they’re particularly refreshing during the hot summer months.

5. Isla Mujeres Day Trip

Just a short ferry ride from Cancún, Isla Mujeres is a must-visit for a tranquil escape. This small island offers beautiful beaches, such as Playa Norte, and the chance to explore the island on a golf cart. Don’t miss the chance to visit the Turtle Farm or snorkel in the vibrant waters of the MUSA.

Insider’s Tip: Rent a golf cart early in the day for more time to explore the island at your own pace.

How To Get There: Ferries to Isla Mujeres depart regularly from Cancún’s hotel zone.

Best Time To Travel: The island is beautiful year-round, but the peak season is from December to April for ideal weather conditions.

6. Discovering the Local Cuisine

Cancún’s culinary scene is a delightful mix of traditional Mexican flavors and international cuisine. Be sure to try local specialties like cochinita pibil (slow-roasted pork) and fresh seafood dishes. Visit Mercado 28 for an authentic market experience or dine in one of the many restaurants in the hotel zone for a more upscale experience.

Insider’s Tip: Explore downtown Cancún for more authentic and budget-friendly dining options.

How To Get There: Mercado 28 and other local eateries are accessible by bus or taxi from the hotel zone.

Best Time To Travel: Year-round, but the less crowded months outside peak tourist season offer a more authentic dining experience.

7. Luxury Shopping and Vibrant Nightlife

Cancún is not just about natural beauty; it’s also a hub for luxury shopping and vibrant nightlife. La Isla Shopping Village offers a range of international and local brands, while Kukulcan Plaza is home to luxury boutiques. As the sun sets, Cancún’s famous nightlife comes alive, with clubs like Coco Bongo and Mandala offering unforgettable experiences.

Insider’s Tip: Look for nightlife packages or club tours to enjoy multiple venues in one night.

How To Get There: The shopping malls and clubs are mainly located in the hotel zone, easily accessible by bus or taxi.

Best Time To Travel: Visit during the spring break season for the most vibrant nightlife, though Cancún is lively year-round.

8. Nature Reserves and Eco-Parks

For nature enthusiasts, Cancún offers access to stunning eco-parks and reserves. Xcaret and Xel-Há are popular eco-parks where you can snorkel, swim in underground rivers, and observe a variety of wildlife. For a quieter experience, visit the Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO World Heritage Site offering untouched landscapes and abundant biodiversity.

Insider’s Tip: Book eco-park tickets in advance online for potential discounts and to avoid long queues.

How To Get There: Organized tours to these parks often include transportation from Cancún.

Best Time To Travel: Avoid peak holiday seasons to enjoy a more serene experience in these natural settings.

9. Cancún’s Interactive Aquarium

The Interactive Aquarium in Cancún offers an up-close experience with marine life, including opportunities to swim with dolphins and feed sharks. It’s an educational and fun experience for all ages, showcasing a variety of aquatic species and conservation efforts.

Insider’s Tip : Consider the dolphin swim experience for a memorable interaction with these intelligent creatures.

How To Get There: The aquarium is located in La Isla Shopping Village in the hotel zone.

Best Time To Travel: Visit on a weekday to avoid the weekend crowds.

10. Golfing in Paradise

Cancún and its surrounding area offer some of the most scenic golf courses in the Caribbean. With courses designed by renowned architects like Jack Nicklaus and Greg Norman, golfers of all levels can enjoy a round in spectacular settings.

Insider’s Tip: Check for twilight rates for a more budget-friendly golfing experience.

How To Get There: Most golf courses are located within a short drive from the hotel zone.

Best Time To Travel: Golfing is excellent year-round, but the cooler months from November to April offer the most comfortable conditions.

11. Day Trips to Holbox Island

Holbox Island, a serene paradise located north of Cancún, is a must-visit for those seeking tranquility and natural beauty. Known for its sandy streets and colorful murals, the island offers a laid-back atmosphere, beautiful beaches, and the chance to see flamingos and whale sharks (seasonally).

Insider’s Tip: Rent a bicycle to explore the small island and discover its hidden gems.

How To Get There: Take a bus or drive to Chiquila, followed by a ferry to Holbox Island.

Best Time To Travel: Visit from June to September for the chance to swim with whale sharks.

12. Scuba Diving and Snorkeling

The waters around Cancún are a paradise for scuba divers and snorkelers. Explore the Great Mesoamerican Reef, the second-largest coral reef system in the world, home to a dazzling array of marine life. From shallow reefs to deeper shipwrecks, beginners and experienced divers can find suitable dive sites . Snorkeling is also popular, with many accessible spots right off the beach or a short boat ride away. The clear Caribbean waters offer excellent visibility, making it a memorable experience for all underwater enthusiasts.

Insider’s Tip: For an extraordinary diving experience, explore the underwater caves (cenotes) just a short drive from Cancún.

How To Get There: Dive shops and tour operators offering scuba diving and snorkeling trips are located throughout Cancún, especially in the hotel zone.

Best Time To Travel: The best diving conditions are from May to September, but snorkeling can be enjoyed year-round.

13. Spa and Wellness Retreats

Cancún is not just about adventure and nightlife; it’s also a haven for relaxation and wellness. The city and its surroundings boast numerous spa resorts offering a wide range of treatments inspired by ancient Mayan practices and modern wellness techniques. From beachfront massages to hydrotherapy and holistic treatments, there’s no shortage of options for those seeking relaxation and rejuvenation.

Insider’s Tip: Look for spa packages that include additional amenities like access to private beach areas or hydrotherapy pools for a more indulgent experience.

How To Get There: Most luxury hotels and resorts in Cancún offer spa services; many are in the hotel zone.

Best Time To Travel: Spa retreats can be enjoyed year-round, but the shoulder seasons offer a more tranquil experience.

14. Adventure Sports and Activities

For adrenaline junkies, Cancún offers a plethora of adventure sports and activities. Try zip-lining through the jungle, parasailing over the Caribbean Sea, or taking an ATV tour through the Mayan wilderness. These activities provide a thrilling way to experience Cancún’s natural landscapes and are suitable for all levels of adventure seekers.

Insider’s Tip: To ensure availability, book adventure tours in advance, especially during peak season .

How To Get There: Adventure tours usually include pick-up and drop-off from major hotels in Cancún.

Best Time To Travel: The dry season from December to April offers the best conditions for most outdoor adventure activities.

15. Cultural Experiences and Workshops

Beyond its beaches and nightlife, Cancún offers a range of cultural experiences and workshops. Participate in cooking classes to learn how to make authentic Mexican cuisine, or join a local artisan workshop to understand traditional crafts. These experiences provide a deeper insight into the rich cultural heritage of the region and are a great way to connect with locals.

Insider’s Tip: Visit local markets with a guide to learn about indigenous ingredients and culinary traditions.

How To Get There: Cultural experiences and workshops can be found throughout Cancún, particularly in downtown areas.

Best Time To Travel: Cultural experiences can be enjoyed year-round, but the off-peak season offers a more authentic and less crowded experience.

The Bottom Line

Cancún is a destination where every traveler can find something to love. Whether you’re drawn to its pristine beaches, rich cultural heritage, vibrant nightlife, or adventure-filled activities, Cancún promises an unforgettable experience. Plan your trip with these tips to fully embrace all this coastal paradise has to offer.

Remember, Cancún is more than a tourist destination; it’s a gateway to experiences that can enrich your understanding of Mexico’s culture and natural beauty. So pack your bags, bring your sense of adventure, and prepare to discover the many facets of Cancún.

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The post Ultimate Cancún Adventure: Your 15-Step Guide to Mexico’s Coastal Gem republished on Passing Thru with permission from The Green Voyage .

Featured Image Credit: Shutterstock / Luis Alfonso Amaya Padron.

For transparency, this content was partly developed with AI assistance and carefully curated by an experienced editor to be informative and ensure accuracy.

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Your last-minute guide to Monday's total solar eclipse

A total solar eclipse will cross North America on Monday , offering millions a rare opportunity to see afternoon skies temporarily darken as the moon blocks the face of the sun.

Tune into NBC News NOW as Lester Holt hosts a two-hour special at 2 p.m. ET Monday from Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The eclipse's path fortuitously cuts across Mexico, 15 U.S. states and a small part of eastern Canada. In all other states in the continental U.S., viewers will be treated to a partial solar eclipse, with the moon appearing to take a bite out of the sun and obscuring part of its light.

Here’s everything you need to know about the rare celestial event.

What is a solar eclipse?

Solar eclipses occur when the sun, moon and Earth align. The moon passes between Earth and sun, temporarily blocking the sun’s light and casting a shadow on Earth.

A total solar eclipse is when the moon fully obscures the sun, whereas a partial solar eclipse means it blocks just a portion of the sun’s face.

Solar eclipses occur only with the new moon. Because the moon’s orbit around Earth is tilted, the three bodies don’t always line up in a way that creates an eclipse.

“Imagine if the moon’s orbit were in the plane of Earth’s orbit around the sun — if that were the case, then every new moon, you’d have a total solar eclipse and every full moon, you’d have a lunar eclipse,” Neil DeGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History, told NBC News. “So, because things don’t always align, it lends to the rarity of the event and the specialness of the event.”

Where and when will the eclipse be visible?

This year’s eclipse will follow a slightly wider path over more populated areas of the continental U.S. than other total solar eclipses have in the recent past.

NASA estimates that 31.6 million people live within what’s known as the path of totality, where the total solar eclipse will be visible. An additional 150 million people live within 200 miles of the path, according to the agency.

The path travels through Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. Tiny parts of Michigan and Tennessee will also be able to witness totality if conditions are clear.

After the eclipse crosses into Canada, it will pass over southern Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton, at the eastern end of Nova Scotia.

Those outside the path of totality can still take part in the astronomical event by viewing a partial solar eclipse — visible throughout all 48 states of the contiguous U.S. — or a NASA livestream.

The timing, including how long totality lasts, depends on the location, but some spots will see the moon fully cover the sun for up to 4 minutes and 28 seconds.

Below is a list of timings for some cities along the path of totality, as  provided by NASA . A number of other resources, including NationalEclipse.com  and  TimeandDate.com , can also help people plan.

• Dallas: Partial eclipse begins at 12:23 p.m. CT and totality at 1:40 p.m.
• Little Rock, Arkansas: Partial eclipse begins at 12:33 p.m. CT and totality at 1:51 p.m.
• Cleveland: Partial eclipse begins at 1:59 p.m. ET and totality at 3:13 p.m.
• Buffalo, New York: Partial eclipse begins at 2:04 p.m. ET and totality at 3:18 p.m.
• Lancaster, New Hampshire: Partial eclipse begins at 2:16 p.m. ET and totality at 3:27 p.m.

How to safely view a solar eclipse

It is never safe to gaze directly at the sun, even when it is partly or mostly covered by the moon. Special eclipse glasses or  pinhole projectors  are required to safely view solar eclipses and prevent eye damage. Failing to take the proper precautions can result in severe eye injury,  according to NASA .

Eclipse glasses are thousands of times darker than normal sunglasses and specially made to enable wearers to look at the sun during these kinds of celestial events.

Sky-watchers should also never view any part of the sun through binoculars, telescopes or camera lenses unless they have specific solar filters attached. Eclipse glasses should not be used with these devices, as they will not provide adequate protection.

However, during the few minutes of totality, when the moon is fully blocking the sun, it is safe to look with the naked eye.

Beware of fake eclipse glasses. On legitimate pairs, the lenses should have a silver appearance on the front and be black on the inside. The manufacturer’s name and address should be clearly labeled, and they should not be torn or punctured. Check, as well, for the ISO logo and the code “IS 12312-2” printed on the inside.

If you don’t have eclipse glasses, you can make a homemade pinhole projector, which lets sunlight in through a small hole, focuses it and projects it onto a piece of paper, wall or other surface to create an image of the sun that is safe to look at. 

All you need is two pieces of white cardboard or plain white paper, aluminum foil and a pin or thumbtack. Cut a 1- to 2-inch square or rectangle out of the center of a piece of white paper or cardboard. Tape aluminum foil over that cut-out shape, then use a pin or thumbtack to poke a tiny hole in the foil.

During the eclipse, place a second piece of white paper or cardboard on the ground as a screen and hold the projector with the foil facing up and your back to the sun. Adjusting how far you hold the projector from the second piece of paper will alter the size of the image on the makeshift screen.

What to look for while viewing the total solar eclipse

For people along the path of totality, there are some fun milestones to keep track of as the total solar eclipse unfolds.

As the eclipse progresses and the sun gets thinner in the sky, it will start to get eerily dark, according to Tyson.

When the last beams of sunlight are about to become obscured, look out for the “diamond ring effect”: The sun’s atmosphere will appear as an illuminated halo, and the last light still visible will look like the diamond of a giant ring.

As the sunlight decreases even further, an effect known as Baily’s beads will be created by the moon’s rugged terrain. Tiny “beads” of light will be visible for only a few seconds around the dark moon, as the last bits of sunlight peer through the moon’s mountains and valleys.

When the moon is fully blocking the sun, it is safe to remove eclipse glasses and look at the total solar eclipse with the naked eye.

Some lucky sky-watchers may even catch a glimpse of a comet .

Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks — nicknamed the “ devil comet ” because an eruption last year left it with two distinct trails of gas and ice in the shape of devil horns — is currently visible from the Northern Hemisphere as it swings through the inner solar system.

The comet can be seen in the early evenings by gazing toward the west-northwest horizon. During the eclipse, when skies darken during totality, it may be possible to see the comet near Jupiter, but its visibility will depend on whether it’s in the middle of an outburst and thus brighter than normal.

Most likely, all eyes will be on the alignment of the moon and sun.

“Most people won’t even notice,” Tyson said. “But if you know to look, it’s there.”

When is the next solar eclipse?

The next total solar eclipse will be in 2026, but it will mostly pass over the Arctic Ocean, with some visibility in Greenland, Iceland, Portugal and northern Spain. In 2027, a total solar eclipse will be visible in Spain and a swath of northern Africa.

The next total solar eclipse visible from North America will be in 2033, but only over Alaska. Then in 2044, a total solar eclipse will cross Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, parts of Canada and Greenland.

The next total solar eclipse to cross the continental U.S. coast-to-coast in will occur in 2045. The path of totality for that eclipse will cut through California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia and Florida.

Denise Chow is a reporter for NBC News Science focused on general science and climate change.

Lucas Thompson is a content producer for the NBC News Climate Unit.