Mexico City

We got into Mexico City at about 9.30pm and we were both shocked to see the city was full of police, on every street corner, driving around patrolling on trucks, all armed heavily, some with machine guns. I assumed it was due to covid, Jonny assumed it was due to Mexico Citys reputation for being dangerous, the jury is still out.

In Mexico, the Covid levels are colour coded, red being the worst, then orange, yellow and green meaning practically back to normal. While we were in Mexico City, it had just gone from red to orange, meaning all shops and services open, hotels, museums and restaurants were supposed to operate at 30% capacity, restaurants to close at 10pm, with alcohol to be stopped at 7pm, and no live music in bars and sadly no salsa or wrestling.

But there were still plenty to keep us entertained for our 5 nights here. Mexico city is enormous, with a sprawling population of 21 million. There were plenty of amazing museums, beautiful parks and streets to explore. After weeks of a lockdowned winter in Dublin it wouldn't be hard to keep us entertained. Even just being in a new place was a thrill. It's winter here, in Mexico City that meant a cool average of 25 degrees during our stay. The bustle and exoticness of a Latin American city with food vendors on every corner was almost overwhelmingly exciting, let alone the chance to make friends with strangers again. 

Our first day brought us to Palacio de Bellas Artes, one of the most beautiful museums I've ever seen, the art deco building in some ways outshining the art pieces it holds. Anywhere we went in Mexico City before entering, you have to walk on a disinfectant mat, have your temperature taken, hand sanitiser is squirted into your hand and in some places, you are also sprayed with a misting, of what I assume is disinfectant spray, around your body. This happened for all museums, shops, restaurants, our hotel, basically anywhere that involved going indoors.

Though the city is busy and buzzing with people, there were very few tourists while we were there, meaning we had usually very busy places virtually to ourselves. The stunning Antropology Museum, which is full of pre-Columbian artifacts including Mayan and Aztecs. The museum usually sees about 2.6 million visitors a year, had about 60 the day we visited. But still the walk through the park to the museum is lined with stands of people trying to sell there wears despite nobody being around to buy them.

I was concerned before coming to Mexico that we wouldn't be welcomed by the locals. In Ireland there is a strong wariness for air travel and foreign tourism with arguments for closing airports. But this attitude seems to be totally absent here, we've felt very welcomed, there's no animosity for our obvious foreign presence, an enthusiastic 'Beinvenido a México' meets us everywhere, even a gardener in a park welcomed us to his city as we walked past. 

Despite the wearing of masks (inside and outside) in Mexico City it very much felt like business as (almost) usual on the streets and in the markets. Of course, like everywhere, there are restrictions that don't make sense. In the historical center some areas are fenced off or have one way entry systems, but in reality people are just forced to go through narrow entries, with no apparent counting of how many people are entering. While the markets are insanely busy, no restrictions on numbers and narrow passage ways full of colour, flavour and Latino Christmas cheer. 

And of course the drink curfew of 7pm, but there's alot to be said for lunch time drinking. We also figured out after a couple of days where we could drink until 10pm (when the restaurants closed) and we really didn't have to search very hard. And even though parties and gatherings weren't supposed to be happening, there was a definite sense that they were, walking past shuttered doorways we could hear Reggaetón blaring from inside, and even were given a flyer for a secret party the night before we left... We didn't go. No doubt the fact that it was the beginning of Las Posada, a nine day Christmas celebration, wasn't helping people's desire to gather. In our hotel a large 'private' family party took place, with gift exchanging, eating, music and salsa! 

While in Mexico City we also took a day trip to Teotihuacan, the amazing Teotihuacan os pyramids. We were joined on the trip by Haviar from Panamá (originally from Venezuela) and José from Guatemala, both who were staying in our hotel. Most residents while we were there were from Latin American countries, on a working holiday, but there were some Europeans and we met just one American.

Our fantastic tour guide showed us just a small section of the 83 sq km site, showing us the Pirámide del luna and Pirámide del Sol which were incredibly impressive. The pyramids only reopened to the public in October, however you still can't climb the piráminde del sol, to prevent over crowding due to covid, although given how few people were there the day we visited, I can't imagine they would have been a problem. After the pyramids we had lunch, and our tour guide gave us cocktails to celebrate our honeymoon, which was very sweet. 

After our five days of the crazy metropolitan of Mexico city, we were ready for the first of many beach stops.