Tiff & Jared's adventures

Girls Trip Round 2!

After a semi-stressful arrival into MEX (tons of airport construction due to the upcoming FIFA World Cup), I made it to my friend’s hostel around 10PM before crashing on the couch and waking up to greet the remaining squad members at 6AM the next morning. Mexico City – here we come!

Day 1

Weary and bleary-eyed, we rallied and went to our first stop of the day before our walking tour – Café Nin (sister cafe to the more popular Panadería Rosetta), where we fueled up on some great breakfast (and a superb atmosphere) before sauntering over to the historic center of the city for our walking tour at 1PM.

The meeting point was Zócalo, otherwise known as the Plaza de la Constitución. This place was insanely busy! There were vendors everywhere selling all sorts of wares, people in costumes, music playing, and tourists and locals alike walking around. Around 1:30, we met our guide in front of the Cathedral and walked the short distance to the Tenochtitlan ruins (Templo Mayor, or main temple).

How unique to have such a preserved example of pre-Hispanic Mexican culture in the middle of the city centre! Templo Mayor was the center point of Tenochtitlán, or the ancient Aztec capital, and was constructed in the 1300s. We learned a bit of the civilization’s history, like how the Aztecs flourished from the 1300s – 1500s before the empire fell in the early 1500s due to various factors brought on by the Spaniards. We talked a bit about human sacrifice and delved into the various meanings and purposes (perpetual indebtedness to the gods and what not) and the various ways in which people were sacrificed – gruesome.

We meandered through the city center and learned about the tradition of quinceañeras, celebrations of Day of the Dead (and how in fact it’s not as its portrayed in movies), the darker history of Mexico’s dictatorship and the subsequent revolution, and the geological state of the city (Mexico City was in fact built on a swamp and is sinking).

The tour ended at the Palacio de Bellas Artes, where we went inside to admire the Art Deco design and cool off a bit. A few things we learned about the palace:

• The building was the crown jewel of President Porfirio Díaz’s dictatorship. He loved French society and the building overall is very similar to the Parisian Opera House (can vouch for this).
• This is the only stage in the world where the curtain is made entirely of Tiffany glass, “Mosaic Curtain for the National Theater of Mexico City”. Our guide said it takes a few minutes during every performance in order to lift the glass curtain, and weighs 24 tons.

After the tour, we crossed the street to the Sears building to get a snack at the terrace overlooking the Palacio. The view was spectacular – we got bar seats facing the palace, and got to get our first good view of the expansive city. The dome definitely reminded me of the opera house we’d seen in Paris!

While walking back to the Airbnb, we stumbled upon Pastelería Ideal, an iconic pastry shop where pastry goers grab a tray, walk around the shop and place all of the sweets to their heart’s desire before getting them wrapped up in a their white box with the blue label (very identifiable on the streets). With eyes bigger than stomachs, we ended up getting an assortment of a dozen cookies and pastries for a whopping $8 to bring back for a late night snack. (Spoiler alert – these were not good).

The last stop of the night was dinner at Bartola, an Italian-American restaurant where we got the biggest chicken parm I’ve ever had in my life (as in four grown women split it and there was still half leftover). We walked around for a bit longer before turning in to prepare for a full day of exploration.

Day 2

Today was our exploration of the cute neighborhoods of Roma Norte and Condesa, lined with spring foliage, cute boutique shops and a nice tinge of city pollution in the air. The day couldn’t be started with anything but a cute coffee shop and some pastries to fuel us for the day ahead! Over the course of a few hours, we walked into various shops, boutiques and art galleries before making our way to Esquina Común, a place I had chosen for a 1-star Michelin lunch. Over the course of 2 and a half hours, we were treated to a six-course lunch including the most beautiful display of shrimp crudo I’ve ever seen, wagyu beef, seared sole fish, fried zucchini blossoms, and the most delicious dessert with chamomile ice cream. After some more strolling, we ended up back at the Airbnb (really enjoying these afternoon siestas here), before we went out to dinner at Axolao (delicious Peruvian-Mexican fusion) and a salsa bar before calling it a night.

Day 3

Another glorious day of shopping, eating and relaxation. The four of us had massage reservations today at Vitali, and took turns exploring weekend markets while the others were getting pampered. Marilyn and I were the first to finish, so we volunteered ourselves to wait in line for lunch after getting delicious matches at Cafe Hema. We tried to go to Michelin- recommended Tacos del Valle the night before but were grossly underprepared for the line (no reservations), so Marilyn and I took one for the team to wait in line while the others wrapped up their massages. Two hours later, we were finally seated and I think it was well worth the wait. Between all of us, we got some flautas and various tacos to share – I had a beef one called the filete that I think was my favorite bite of the weekend!

After a delicious meal yet again, we meandered some more, and stumbled upon this cool farmer’s market where I found some solid finds (printed jacket, mushroom keychain and a pottery piece). Maybe finally shopped out, we went back for our daily siesta before getting dressed to go out for a light dinner and drinks at Imbiss (tried to get into Handshake Speakeasy, without reservations, supposedly one of the best bars in North America, how naive of us). The wine bar we went to had delicious snacks and cocktails, and then we ended up going back to the Airbnb to have a girls night full of face masks, Bridgerton and Marilyn practicing some Reiki on us!

Day 4

The day started early with a food tour at 9AM. This wasn’t any food tour – we spent 4.5 hours biking through various neighborhoods in the city! The first stop on the tour was Maque, a cute cafe where we had a coffee and traditional concha. Our tour was a group of six ladies, us, a badass director from Barcelona/New York and another cool chica from Miami – always love when the vibes of a tour group are spot on! After a quick fuel, we were off for the Paseo de la Reforma, (one of the principal avenues in the city), which is closed on Sundays for walkers, cyclists and runners. It was an awesome and unique experience to be able to cycle on such a typically busy street, and see how many people were out and about enjoying the wonderful spring weather. Halfway through our ride along the avenue, we stopped to listen to our guide, Símon, talk about the lost 43 students that vanished in 2014. It was a very sobering history about the dark relationship between the Mexican government and cartels, but I’m glad Simon shared it with us, and we were able to view the faces of the victims as we continued our bike ride.

Our next stop brought us to a street market, across the street from the Art Gardens (a variety of beautiful works of art sold by various vendors in the park). We stopped here because on Sundays specifically, one of the vendors makes braised lamb, which we got to try in both a taco dorado and flauta. While I’m not typically a fan of lamb, it was delicious in a taco, and very flavorful with all the toppings (fresh salsas and cilantro). It was a fun experience to walk around the market after and see the variety of different produce and other items being sold.

I enjoyed this tour because we stopped at non-food places as well to learn more about the history of various neighborhood. For example, we stopped at One Opera and learned how this has been shut down for decades but still remains a cultural landmark of the neighborhood. Continuing on, our next stop was the Moroccan Pavilion, a Moorish-inspired hidden gem otherwise known as the “Mexican Alhambra“. Within the park, there was an ice cream stand with homemade nieves and helados – I tried their passion fruit and guava flavors while we walked around the park for a little and soaked up the sun.

At this point, it was getting pretty hot and we were starting to slow down a bit. Luckily, the next stop wasn’t food. We went to a traditional pulquería in San Rafael, la Canica, to try this low ABV drink made from fermented maguey sap. I got a guava-flavored pint; the flavor was nice but it was much too sweet for me and the consistency was a bit like a slimy smoothie.

We made our way back to Reforma, joining the hordes of people and passing the Angel of Independence before making our way to Chapultepec Park (didn’t have too much time to walk around but nice to pop in). Our last stop before making it back to the bike shop was another street taqueria in a market in Roma Norte (got to try a tasty chorizo taco with walnuts and raisins). The very last part of the tour was making it back to the shop where there were a bunch of food trucks, and we got to try some micheladas (in Mexico, it’s beer with lemon juice, instead of the tomato-based micheladas I’d seen in Chile).

The bike ride was no small feat – half of the time there were no bike lanes, and drivers in Mexico City seem to defy any rule of traffic law so it was quite the accomplishment that we all made it back in one piece to have a drink before we went back to our Airbnb to rest for a bit! Even though it wasn’t overly hot, I ended up getting quite the sunburn – easy to forget that Mexico City sits at 7K above sea level.

Eager to try some of the recommended bars we’d so painstakingly researched, we rallied ourselves to go to Bar Mauro, where we got some tasty milk punches and mezcal cocktails, before dinner. On the way to dinner, stumbled upon yet another market in Roma Norte open on weekends, Bazaar Resiliente. The timing worked out perfect, and we ended up walking to Marmota right on time for our dinner reservation, where we had a tasty meal of comfort food. This was the last night we were all together so we went back to hang out and pack before Taylor and I had to wake up at 4AM this next day.

Day 5

What.a.grind. Taylor and I had to be at the Angel of Independence at 5AM for shuttle pickup for our hot air balloon tour. We booked a full day excursion through WeFly that started with a balloon ride over the Teotihuacan pyramids before exploring other parts of the area. As soon as we got on the field, we witnessed dozens of balloons being inflated simultaneously in the early morning hours, and we were getting super excited to board our own flight! The ride in total lasted about 30 minutes, and the winds glided us through the air, right past the pyramids, before we rose in height (our maximum elevation was 9,400 feet). The air was crisp and clear, and we were kept warm by the heat of the fire used to fuel the balloon. We had 8 people in total in our basket, the pilot, and us and another couple on one side, and three people on the other side. It was a surreal experience to be gliding above pyramids that are hundreds of years old, but to also have neighborhood and city buildings sprinkled throughout the landscape as well. All in all, we were in the sky for about 30 minutes before we landed in a remote field – what a unique landing experience. We essentially braced for impact and four Mexican men jumped onto the basket to hold it down so that we wouldn’t take flight again! Very unique experience and bucket list item indeed.

Afterwards, we were shuttled to La Cueva, where we were served breakfast in an underground cave (a little hokey of an experience but fun nonetheless). Then, we went to a cultural center where we learned more about the history of the Teotihuacan culture, before arriving at the archaeological site for a guided tour. At this point, we were a little physically and mentally exhausted so some of the knowledge was lost on us, but some fun facts:

• The civilization flourished from 200 BC to 700 AD
• The Teotihuacan flower is depicted in many cultural items, and consists of 4 petals and a center, meant to represent both the cardinal directions, and spiritually the circle of life (birth, growth, reproduction, death, and transcendence)
• At its peak, Teotihuacan was home to approximately 200K inhabitants
• It’s estimated only 20% of the ruins have been unearthed, with the rest remaining underground. Further, excavation of the site didn’t begin until around 1905.

We ended our tour around 12:30PM and made our way back to CDMX, where we had a nice and long siesta before going out for one more evening to stroll the streets of Roma Norte and go to Galanga Thai House for the last supper.

Hasta Luego, Mexico City!