Good bye Huatulco! Hello Mexico City, we are back!! We flew out of Huatulco Jan 25th and made our way back to this amazing city, we were very excited to be back!! We landed mid afternoon and made our way to our hotel all on our own, no shuttle or subway this time but we figured out their prepaid taxi service. Worked pretty slick and with no snags we arrived at our home for the next 6 days. Our friends we met in Huatulco but live in MC found us a great hotel close to their apartment and it was the perfect place. The City Express hotel was situated right inside a huge mall with stores, restaurants as well as a grocery store in it. It made our stay so easy, good find friends!! We were greeted at the door by our friend Ari who we then had a great visit with until Era and the kids showed up after school was over. We then went for a walk to their place and to a local park that they like to go to. Doug and the kids were excited to hit up the candy section in the markets by the play park!! So many options!! It was nice night, everything was so close by so we could walk it and take in the street life, we all had a great time catching up with this amazing family. Our next few days were going to be jam packed with fun and adventure, the planning had began and we couldn't wait!!
THURSDAY - Era and the kids were off to school and Ari made his way to our hotel to pick us up to take us downtown to catch the tour bus. Thought we would take in the tour of the city and familiarize ourselves with everything. We arrived to hop aboard the bus only to realize that because of a protest in front of the American Embassy,(thanks Trump) most of the streets were blocked off. No tour for us that day so instead tour guide Ari drove us through one of his favorite areas called Polanca, it was very beautiful! Walked around for a bit and took in a couple of malls which were way out of our league, super high end stores with police and security everywhere. Pretty impressive!!
We passed quite a few bike racks full of bikes that were there for public use for free, if used for under an hour. It is the cities way of trying reduce the amount of traffic on the streets, which we realized very quickly is a major problem in Mexico City. Our friends have a car there and are not allowed to drive it on Wednesdays and then ever second Saturday. Their licence is color coded so if they are caught driving on a day in which their color is not allowed out they will be fined. Even with that system in place the streets are jammed majority of the time, it is just their way of life. They have freeways that run above most of the main streets as well but those are the ones you pay for, you are charged 3 Pesos for every KM. When it is rush hour though those freeways are not much faster though!! We will never complain about traffic again, we have no right to based on what other people are faced with daily. I think that daily fight with traffic would make me loco!!
After our drive around tour with Ari we went to another mall where we met Era and the kids, school was over and they could walk there to meet us. We had a wonderful meal at the Olive Garden with them and then we let the kids have some fun at Chucky Cheese. What a place!! lol Made a last minute decision on our way home to stop into a park and church in Coyoacan. So beautiful to see the Catholic church which is around 200 years old and to see the park area. It was full of restaurants, shops, music and many people enjoying the evening. So glad we made the stop, what a fun full day!!
FRIDAY - No school or work for Era and the kids so we had a fun day planned with all of us!! Made an early start out to an area called Santa Fe which had a huge mall in it called Centro Comercial Santa Fe, not only did it have hundreds of stores it had an indoor skating rink. That is what we were after!! Eeeee!! The kids were all so excited to get out on the ice they were coming out of their skin, who am I kidding, Doug was too!! Before we skated Doug, Ari, Rhett, Adison and Kevin all went out to an outdoor Go Cart track for some racing fun. They had a blast!! Era and I went to the mall on our own with Nate and Emilia since they wouldn't be big enough to drive the carts, we enjoyed some quiet time to visit. Once the whole crew was back together again we hit the ice to have some skating fun, it has been months since the kids have had skates on! Such a great time and we had a good laugh when a lady approached the boys once they stepped off the ice to ask them if they would like to join a hockey team called the Santa Fe Kings. Too funny!! Great day had by all!!
SATURDAY - One of the most anticipated days in Mexico City, we went to KidZania!! Super cool place with an even cooler concept! KidZania is an indoor amusement park/entertainment center, it is a city built to scale for children to experience real life jobs and earn currency. There are some fun games and activities but they all cost money, the kids were given $50 in KidZania money with their admission but after that is gone they needed a job to earn more to do more. Great concept right?? To enter we had to purchase tickets to enter and to fly there on the airline Interjet, they even had security to go through just like at a real airport. They even took my water!! lol The kids had a blast running from job to job earning money which they uploaded onto their credit cards they had applied for at the bank. Rhett and Adison went to the University of Mexico to earn a degree, they took a "mini" coarse in Medicine and they also took a drivers test to drive the cars there. Nate took a drivers test to drive a motorcycle and loved the opportunity he had to be Firefighter. He rode into the area where an apartment was on fire in the back of a firetruck and then sprayed water onto the burning building. They did soooo many different jobs that day, Policeman, Food Inspector, Electrician, Optometrist, Baker, worked at Walmart, Lala Dairy and went to gym to be Boxer and a Fitness Trainer. These are just a few, to be honest it was all a bit overwhelming and mind blowing, I felt like I was in a bit of a dream!! lol UNBELIEVABLE place and my only wish is that we could have been there longer, the 10 hours we were there wasn't enough!! I will put a few pictures on the blog but I have so many it will be hard to choose! We loved the experience we had and will never forget this day, a big thanks to our friends who opened our eyes to this wonderful place!! :) :) :) We hope to return one day!
SUNDAY - Day trip out to the Teotihuacan Pyramids which is ancient city located about 45min NE of Mexico City, known for its Avenue of the Dead, Pyramid of the Moon, Pyramid of the Sun, uncovered murals and multi-family living quarters. Teotihuacan is one of the archaeological sites with the longest history of exploration in Mexico and it is also one of the world's most impressive archaeological sites. IMPRESSIVE it was!! We arrived early to avoid the crowds, seeing it was a Sunday we knew it would be busy especially because the park is free for locals on Sundays and the site is such a popular place to visit. Entrance fee for us was $6 a person and the kids were free, they are always free in Mexico City, love it! Nate stayed behind with Era and Emilia that day, figured the younger ones wouldn't enjoy the day and all the walking as much as much as if they could spend the day playing together. We came prepared for the cooler weather but not really, we have very little in our suitcases for cooler temperatures so for the first hour we froze in our light hoodies! It had been a long time since we saw our breath and experienced just above 0 temperatures! Big babies we are now! lol Arriving into the site was a bit of a surreal experience and the power of the place was so incredible!
The city is split down the middle by the Avenue of the Dead and that is where we walked our way to the furthest pyramid, which was the Pyramid of the Moon. The morning walk in was extra special to us because for whatever reason there were about 15-20 hot air balloons in the distance behind the massive pyramids, very magical! We timed our day perfectly because we were there way ahead of all of the crowds that eventually showed up but we had it perfect, we climbed up both pyramids without waiting and our pictures had very few people in them. When we finished in the museum and walked out to the site there were hundreds of people wrapped around the one pyramid waiting to climb up, it was crazy busy!! The site is so amazing because you can climb up 3/4 of the way on the Pyramid of the Moon and then all of the way up the Pyramid of the Sun. Being up so high and seeing the area from that view was just spectacular, makes you feel so small and insignificant in this world. So much history and so much to learn about life before us!! From up there you could also see areas that had yet to be discovered, partial hills with some rock exposed were off in the distance so you knew they were still discovering new areas. We toured through the museum as well and they had quite a collection of artifacts displayed. It was interesting because for as valuable as the items are nothing was behind secured glass or bars, very open and trusting environment. So nice to see! I have also read that they have found artifacts there that line up with and coincide with remains discovered in Machu Pichu, Peru. So cool!! The day could have not been better or more memorable, it is one that will definitely top our list of favorite places we have been to. So thankful for Ari and his willingness to drive us out there and spend the day with us! Your the best!! Amazing day, so spectacular and we would go back in a heart beat!! Our day ended back at Ari and Era's place where we enjoyed an amazing meal prepared by Era, it felt so good to be in a home and to enjoy time with this wonderful family. It is going to hard to leave them! :(
MONDAY - Our last full day in Mexico City and so we were determined to see the last few "must sees" in Mexico City and we were hoping for no protests so we could hop on the city tour bus to tour around. Ari picked us and drove us downtown to the historical center of Mexcio City, pretty cool to walk the streets made of cobble stone and to see all of the beautiful old buildings. So much detail and work put into them! Took a peek at one of the smaller Catholic churches downtown, not sure which one it was but it was so beautiful.
From there we made our way to Zocalo which is the name of the main square in central Mexico City, it is also one of the largest city squares in the world. It is bordered by the Cathedral, the National Place, Templo Mayor and the Old Portal de Mercaderes. In the center is an enormous Mexican flag which they lower and raise daily. We made our way around the square and into the Metropolitan Cathedral, it is the largest cathedral in the Americas, over 400 years old and it is situated atop the former Aztec sacred precinct. We were able to walk inside and look around, I cant believe the size and the beauty one building can hold. Pretty spectacular to say the least!!
As we walked around outside the church we came upon Templo Mayor which was one of the main temples of the Aztecs in their capital city of Tenochititlan, which is now Mexico City. So, right there in the center of the city is a ruin site that you can go and see, we didn't go in but you could see the majority of it from outside of the gate. How incredible to think of the ruins right there in the city and so much of it has probably never been discovered yet. WOW!
Seeing and experiencing Zocalo was great and so once we saw all that we wanted to we seeked out the big hop on, hop off tour bus. It is a great way to see the city with a view from the top, they give you head phones to plug in so you can tune in to the channel of your language to get all of the important information. Great idea but ours didn't work, we all ended up getting an electric shock from the plug, haha !! Even though we didn't get the tourist information we loved the drive through the different parts of Mexico City. Saw many beautiful buildings, museums, monuments and more protests. Apparently there are protests for one thing or another daily, people like to be heard here or else they just like to block traffic even more than it already is! :0 There are 4 different bus lines that loop through certain parts of the city and we were able to do 2 of them before we were ready to get off and make our way home.
Since we had been in the city for awhile we knew how to do things and were aware of how much certain things should cost, taxis being one of them!! Never settle on a price when you flag one down, always ask for the meter, great tip from Ari but on our final day that didn't work and we started to get gringoed. Our tour was done so we went to an official taxi stand and asked for a meter taxi and showed our hotel to him, he wasn't liking the meter idea but agreed anyway. There must be a different start button for us tourists because as soon as he started it was at 27 pesos, not the 8 it should have been. Doug told him that it was wrong and argued with him as the guy drove away, he shrugged his shoulders and didn't care. We cared!! Once we were in an area where we were able to get out we told him to pull over and we got out, no idea where we were but the feeling of getting ripped off by another taxi driver drove us crazy! In the end we found a good taxi and paid him 60 pesos with a very good tip included for a 20 min ride and paid the rip off guy 47 pesos to go 2 min!! We hate getting ripped off and we have had a few experiences along the way on this trip, it always seems to be the taxi drivers. They really do make a bad name for themselves and it has been our goal to research and know better or to just avoid them completely. Grr! Our tourist tour day was so awesome and it ended with a wonderful night hanging out with our wonderful friends once last time. We went to one of their favorite places close to their place, it is the Terrace which is on the top floor above Liverpool. It is basically a high end food court with restaurant quality food that serves wine or beer with your meal. They have an outdoor eating area on the roof top and a kids play area off to the side, what a great place!!
We loved it but it was a sad night in the end, always wonderful to meet such great people who become great friends but it is so tough saying good bye so often. We were so blessed to have met Ari, Era, Emilia and Kevin!! We love you guys and cant express the gratitude we have for all that you done for us!! You will be forever in our hearts, you need to come to Canada so we can repay the favor!! We absolutely LOVE Mexico City, it is such an unique place So full of culture, history and traditions but it also very modern and hip. It was a surprise place for us on this adventure and it is one place that we will never forget!! Our flight for Cancun, Mexico jetted off Tuesday morning so we made our way by taxi back to the airport to successfully navigate ourselves onto the plane. Everything here is an adventure and a challenge, not a laid back place that's for sure. Keeps you on your toes!! Mexico City has been an eye opener and life changer for us small town Canadians and I believe we came out on the better side, FAREWELL MEXICO CITY!!
We are all safe, happy and our hearts are full!!
Love from the Steel family XXXXX
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