Biblioteca de Mexico in Mexico City
Mexico North America Travel Diary

Our Favorite Moments in Mexico

Visited: April 2019

The first country on our RTW trip was Mexico. We spent eight days in Mexico City, then took a bus to San Miguel de Allende for four days (including a day trip to Guanajuato), then returned to Mexico City to stay in a different part of the city for a long weekend. Here are some highlights:

Teotihuacan pyramids

Touring the Teotihuacan pyramids

Jonathan: These pyramids are all that remain of a large ancient Mesoamerican civilization about which little is known in comparison to the Mayans or Aztecs. An easy bus ride (as part of our tour) from Mexico City, the morning tour was awesome. We were also able to add onto what we learned from the tour when we visited the National Anthropology Museum later in the week.

Visiting the markets

Both: Markets are easy to find in Mexico City. Whether you’re looking for groceries, prepared food, a hat to protect you from the sun, a souvenir for a friend or a batch of freshly made tortillas, you can find it at a mercado. One of our favorites was the Mercado de Coyoacán, in no small part due to the delicious tostada counter inside [pictured above]. The artisan market in San Miguel de Allende was also very neat, as well as the Mercado Hidalgo in Guanajuato.

House-peeping in San Miguel de Allende

Megan: The homes in San Miguel de Allende were SO. PRETTY. I could have taken photos of them all day. Oh wait … I did.

Cemitas street food in Mexico City
Enjoying cemitas on our street food tour

Street food tour with Eat Mexico

Both: We loved this tour so much we wrote an entire post about it. So we won’t rehash everything here.

Iglesia de San Juan Bautista in Coyoacan, Mexico City

Attending Easter Mass in Spanish

Jonathan: Being in Mexico during Holy Week (Semana Santa), it was very cool to see the various celebrations during the week. Everything from random firecrackers in the early hours of the morning, to Mass on Easter Sunday. I wasn’t able to follow along quite as well as I’d hoped, but I definitely admired the efficiency of the masses. This church (Iglesia de San Juan Bautista) held mass every hour, on the hour throughout the day with only a break for lunch!

Perusing public libraries

Megan: I was most looking forward to visiting Biblioteca Vasconcelos [above left] because of its unique design, but I also loved Biblioteca de Mexico [feature image]. In addition to its traditional public library spaces, there were a plethora of lovely courtyards and small private collections with a more old-fashioned aesthetic [above right]. San Miguel de Allende also has a very active local library that puts out a weekly newspaper and offers a robust English-language collection.

Ogling the jacaranda trees in Mexico City

Megan: Every time we walked by one of these (which was often), I would pause and say, “Oh, I just love these purple trees.”


Stay tuned for our full travel guides to Mexico City and San Miguel de Allende!

Megan

Megan is a librarian by training, currently on a journey around the world with her husband, Jonathan. She enjoys visiting bookstores, libraries and coffeeshops while traveling.

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