Our trip to Mexico City was really an adventure. Before the trip, the teachers in school told us a lot about the city, of where to visit, what to watch out for, what you buy and eat and what to avoid, etc. They all warned us about the craziness of the subway in the city. All of those warnings actually made me nervous about the trip even though I have lived and traveled to big cities in the US.
A pleasant surprise was the bus trip. The bus ride was just wonderful. I guess “autobuses” is the main transportation means in Mexico, thus the bus industry is very developed here. In big cities, there are big bus stations with so many buses that service people to different locations in the country. All long distance buses, the equivalent of Greyhound in the US, are very well equipped and comfortable. Air-condition is a given, but there are individual headsets and controls, several TV screens that show good movies along the trip, the seats are way better than the seats in any coach bus and airplane seat in the US. With the same width of the bus as of the ones in the US, there are only 3 seats per row instead of 4 or 5 as the one in the US. For the 3 hour trip from Querétaro to Mexico City, they even serve sandwich and drink. All of us were really content with the bus ride, and no one wanted to leave the bus at the end of the trip. American!
We had to take 3 different Metro lines to get to our hotel from the bus station. It was rush hour in Mexico City so you could imagine how bad it was. I am no stranger to subway trains since I’ve lived in the New Jersey/New York before, but having luggage and taking the train in a new city where you don’t know the language is a different story. At one stop, because the volume of people getting on and off the train was too great, I was pushed off the train. I had to fight my way to get back onto the same train. What an experience.
The first night in the city, we went to Tacuba restaurant. I still haven’t found out whether the name of the restaurant had anything to do with Cuban food, but the food was great. There was a group of musicians playing guitars and mandolins and singing while we eat. They were great players and singers. People just love music here. On one of the buses in the city that we took, there were two traveling artists who played really good Spanish guitar and sang. I just enjoyed them so much.
The hotel where we stayed was nice, but like most houses in the country, there was no air condition. It was cool enough during that weekend but we had to keep the fan on when we were in our rooms. Saturday night, there was some sort of party on the floor on top of mine. I wasn’t bothered by it but some others in the group couldn’t sleep because of the noise; and apparently the hotel manager couldn’t do anything to stop the noise. So if you asked some of the guys in my group, they would recommend not to stay in this hotel even though it was only 5 minute walk from the center of the city. The food served in the restaurant of this hotel was great, though a bit pricy. In the morning, there was breakfast buffet for 90 pesos (around 7 US$). There were all sorts of food, from fruits, yogurt to tacos, bread and different kinds of meat. I only wished they had opened the buffet for dinner instead. Sunday morning, since we didn’t have Mass until 12, I was able to have a full breakfast, and stayed after to watch a soccer game on TV.
There were 3 places we visited on this trip to D.F. (aka. Mexico City): the Pyramids at Teotihuacán, the Basilica of Guadalupe where our Lady appeared to St. Juan Diego, and the Cathedral at the center of the city. I will write about these places in another entry.
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