Sight seeing
Trip Start
Sep 01, 2005
1
12
65
Trip End
May 11, 2006
Mexico City,
Mexico
Monday, October 10, 2005
Ideas of how somewhere is going to be are normally very different to how it is once you actually arrive there. Everyone kept telling me Mexico City was really dirty, busy and really polluted; and a lot of what I read was about gun crime, car jackings, and robbery, thus the image I had in my head was one of a crime ridden shanty town.
I'm sure all these things exist but I don't think they define Mexico City and nor are they as prevalent as they're made out to be. What I've seen of Mexico City is large squares, clean streets, impressive buildings, and lots of art and culture
Bad back
.We're staying in the Centro Historico district, just off the main square that is surrounded my grand buildings, one being the Cathedral and another the Presedential Palace. In the centre of the square is a huge Mexican flag, looks about the size of a tennis court. The street our hostel is on is quiet and deserted by night but by day transforms into a noisy street market (one of the black and white photos). It seems that they sell anything they can get their hands on, I saw one guy selling just surgical tape, another just car aerials; worryingly one guy was selling knuckle dusters and cross bows.
On our first day here we took a tour bus around the city, we jumped off and took a look around the Museum of Anthropology, which we were told was free but it turns out this is only the case if you're Mexican. Yesterday we took the Metro to the North Bus Terminal and caught a bus to the ancient city of Teotihuacán which contains the World's 3rd largest pyramid, really great but people were trying to sell us crap non-stop.
The Metro here is great, you can get a single ticket to any station for 2 pesos (10p), think London Underground should take a leaf out of their book.
Lewis and Charlie are leaving today to get a standby flight to Peru, so It's Norman no mates for me for the next couple of days. We've made some friends in the hostel we're staying in so it's not all bad, people drink in the hostel bar at night and tend to go out somewhere after it's closed. I want to go to some of the clubs here, which are supposed to be really good, so hopefully something'll be happening on Friday night.
Think I will visit the Frida Kahlo museum before I leave on Sunday
