Photo: Jeses · CC BY-SA 2.5 · Wikimedia Commons
Photo: Jeses · CC BY-SA 2.5 · Wikimedia Commons
City Guide
Three days in CDMX: the historic center, the food, and the neighborhoods. How to handle one of the world's great cities.
Mexico City is one of the world's great cities and one of its most underrated: Aztec ruins, colonial palaces, world-class museums, and a food scene that might be the best on earth. It's enormous; the trick is clustering by neighborhood.
Three days is a tasting menu, not the full meal. But it's enough to fall for the city.
Start at the Zócalo: the Metropolitan Cathedral, the National Palace (the Rivera murals are free and stunning), the Templo Mayor (the Aztec ruins, right next to the cathedral). The layers of history here are dizzying.
Photo: Diego Delso · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Afternoon: the Palacio de Bellas Artes (the art deco/white marble palace), then the Alameda. Evening: the historic center's cantinas and rooftop bars. The city's altitude (2,250m) means pace yourself and hydrate.
Chapultepec Park (one of the world's great urban parks): the National Museum of Anthropology (the Aztec and Maya collections are world-class; give it three hours), the castle on the hill, the lake.
Photo: Dge · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Afternoon: the Roma and Condesa neighborhoods. The art deco streets, the parks, the cafes: this is the Mexico City of the imagination. Evening: the food. Tacos al pastor, the mezcalerias, the restaurants that rank among the world's best.
Coyoacán (Frida Kahlo's Casa Azul; book ahead), the San Ángel market on Saturdays, or Xochimilco (the trajineras, the floating gardens, the party boats).
Photo: Anagoria · CC BY 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Evening: lucha libre. The Friday night wrestling at Arena México is the most fun tourist activity in the city: masks, acrobatics, pure theater. Check our Mexico City pages for concerts and events; the city's calendar is enormous.
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