Last day in Mexico - famous houses

There are so many ways we could have spent our last day, but we didn't fancy too much travelling as we have been on a lot of buses lately and we have a long long journey ahead of us back to Japan on Thursday.

We opted to do some city stuff and started by taking the metro to the neighbourhood of Coyoacan to visit some famous houses. The first thing we saw down in the metro station was a group of about 20 vulnerable-looking Japanese tourists with a guide. They are safer in a group I suppose. We jumped on Linea 2 bound for Universidad, changed at Higaldo and took Linea 3 straight to Coyoacan. I liked how each station had a picture - very easy to spot your stop! Many of the stations were names of generals and revolutionaries. I liked the picture of Zapata the best (because of the hat).
Have a read at another blogger's entry about the choice of metro stations - very interesting (and funny - you can also see the picture of Emilianio Zapata) http://dayeffay.blogspot.com/2007/11/metro-station-history-of-mexico.html

As we came out of the metro station, we spotted a Starbucks..... yeah, in we went.....I know, I know. I can't get over how friendly everyone is - people always ask where we are from and we have a bit of banter. It's refreshing as in Japan, people in shops and cafes never deviate from the script.

We took a taxi from there to Frida's house. You couldn't miss it as it is the brightest blue you can imagine. We enjoyed visiting where she lived with Diego Rivera for 25 years and where they both worked. Many of their paintings were there and a lovely collection of family photographs.

From there, we walked to Trotsky's house. It was also easy to spot - the windows had been walled up for his protection (so much for that). I'll let the pictures speak as I was allowed to take photos inside for a small fee. http://picasaweb.google.com/jomynard/MexicoCityPart2

















Me at "La Casa Azul" (home of artists Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera)

Back to Mexico City

So here we are again over a month on. We took a first class pullman bus from Puebla to get here (no more 2nd class Mexican buses for us) and checked into this fine hotel. Loving the last bit of luxury before the loooooooooong long journey home tomorrow.

Diego Rivera

Mural at the Palace

Sergio Junior

This afternoon we met our friend Sergio’s son, Sergio in the lobby. He’s a university student in Mexico City. We spend a nice couple of hours with him which included a trip up the Latino Americano tower for great views of the city.

Templo Mayor

Remains of an Aztec temple right in the centre of Mexico City. We also visited the excellent museum.

Exploring D.F.

We were staying in the Centro Historico so were able to walk to the main square (Zocalo) easily. It’s so impressive! We did a lap of the square and walked past the palace and the cathedral and few streets around. We found a street café doing tacos that smelled delicious. We ordered 2 beers and a taco each. The tacos were SO DELICIOUS that we ordered 3 more. We demolished them and ordered 2 more. My god they were good. I have obviously never had real Mexican food before, it’s incredible. I wondered whether sitting in the street we would get hassled a lot, but we weren’t really. Just a couple of beggars and a guy with a big head of hair & moustache with a guitar doing requests (he even had a list of suggestions).

The next morning we woke up at 5am and couldn’t get back to sleep. Not quite over the jetlag yet then. We couldn’t pick up the wireless from our room so went down to the lobby with our iphones. It was cold and the lights were off (the night porter wouldn’t put them on). Never mind, only 2 hours to wait until breakfast and 4 hours to wait until anything was open.

This morning was reserved for culture and we started with a coffee in a design museum. Then we went to the palace. The murals painted by Diego Rivera were amazing. The one above the main stairs depicted various events in Mexican history. We even spotted a Frida Kahlo lookalike.

Taxi ride in Mexico City

Our taxi driver seemed old school until he whipped out the SatNav. It didn’t take long to get to the hotel. We drove down a very long street containing shoe shops, old fashioned clothes shops and sex shops, side by side. Street vendors worked the traffic queues at the lights selling the usual kinds of things: newspapers, drinks, snacks, lottery tickets, hats….knives….yes, BIG kitchen knives. I wonder if he gets much business. It’s not exactly an impulse purchase as you sit at the lights and I can’t imagine that people would go there especially to buy his knives. Perhaps he uses one of them to threaten people into buying them, who knows.