Mexico City — CDMX — is one of the world's great cities and one of the most underappreciated by UK visitors who associate Mexico primarily with Cancún beach holidays. The largest city in North America (population 22 million in the metropolitan area), it sits at 2,240 metres above sea level on an ancient Aztec lake bed, and combines extraordinary pre-Columbian history with magnificent colonial architecture, world-class museums (more than any city outside Europe), a culinary scene of extraordinary creativity and depth, and the kind of vibrant, humming urban energy that few cities anywhere can match.
Mexico City's historic centre — the Zócalo and surrounding Centro Histórico — contains some of the Americas' most significant colonial architecture above the foundations of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán. The Templo Mayor archaeological site at the Zócalo's northeastern corner gives direct access to the Aztec ceremonial centre, discovered beneath Mexico City's streets only in 1978. The National Museum of Anthropology in Chapultepec Park is, by general consensus, the finest museum in the Americas and one of the great museums of the world.
Teotihuacán
An hour north of Mexico City, Teotihuacán — the ancient city that was the largest in the pre-Columbian Americas (population 150,000–200,000 at its peak around 500 CE) — is one of the most extraordinary archaeological sites in the world. The Avenue of the Dead, flanked by the 65-metre Pyramid of the Sun (the third-largest pyramid on Earth) and the 43-metre Pyramid of the Moon, runs 2km from the Moon Plaza to the Ciudadela — a distance that conveys the enormous scale of a city that was built a thousand years before the Aztecs arrived.
Climbing the Pyramid of the Sun (248 steps) provides a panoramic view across the entire archaeological zone and the mountains beyond — one of the Americas' great archaeological panoramas. The site opens at 9am; arriving then allows exploration before the tour buses from Mexico City arrive at 11am.
Frida Kahlo Museum & Coyoacán
The Frida Kahlo Museum (La Casa Azul — the Blue House) in the southern neighbourhood of Coyoacán is one of Mexico's most visited museums and a pilgrimage site for art lovers worldwide. Kahlo's childhood home, where she lived, worked and died, is preserved with extraordinary intimacy — her studio, her bed, her medical corsets, her personal diaries and a collection of her possessions create a three-dimensional portrait of an extraordinary woman. Coyoacán itself is a charming, bohemian neighbourhood of cobbled streets, independent restaurants and weekend markets that makes an excellent half-day away from the Centro.
Food & Neighbourhoods
Mexico City is one of the world's most exciting food cities — the country that invented corn, chocolate, vanilla, chilli and avocado has developed a culinary culture of extraordinary depth and creativity. The street food (tacos al pastor from rotating spits in the city centre, tlayudas in Oaxacan restaurants, tostadas in La Merced market, tamales from street carts at dawn) is as good as any restaurant. The Roma and Condesa neighbourhoods — tree-lined Art Deco districts with a European atmosphere — have Mexico City's finest restaurant concentration, including several ranked among the world's best.
