Birthday Weekend in Mexico City

For my birthday weekend, I met up with some other volunteers in Mexico City. On Saturday morning, we re-visited Casa Azul, the house where Frida Kahlo was born and spent many years. Day of the Dead is over, but many of the museums still have their alters up (which is why you are going to see some more day of the dead things in this post).

We then went down to Xochimilco, a delegation in the Southern part of the city. Our 1st stop was at the Dolores Olmedo Museum. In short, she was a very, very rich woman that collected art from around the world and financed a lot of Diego Riveras work. Her house, the museum, is filled with art from around the world, as well as several rooms dedicated to Riveras art and 1 room of Frida’s paintings. Peacocks freely roam the grounds of the estate. There is also a fenced in area with a lot of Xoloescuintle, a hairless (and I my eyes, ugly) Aztec dog. It was amazing how much they looked like their statue.

We then went to what is probably the most famous attraction in Xochimilco, the canals. Back when the Aztecs were still living in Mexico City, the canals contained a series of floating gardens, used to cultivate crops. Now it features lots and lots of boats filled with people, beer, mariachis, food, and vendors of all kinds. None of the boats have motors and all are pushed by hand, kinda like a Mexican gondola.

On Sunday, we all headed our own ways and I finally made it up to the Basilica de Guadalupe, the most visited Catholic site in all of Mexico and 2nd most visited in the world. The Virgin Guadalupe is one of the most important religious icons in all of Mexico and her image appears on everything around the country. At the site, you can visit the new basilica, the old basilica, and climb Tepeyac Hill to another church and see the site where the Virgin appeared in front of Juan Diego on December 12, 1531. Pilgrimages are made every year around the 12th of December, and even though I visited in November, they had already started to arrive.

Inside the new Basilica

The old and the new

My last stop was Tlatelolco and the Plaza de las tres cultras (Plaza of the 3 Cultures). In the plaza, you have Aztec ruins, a Spanish church, and a modern Mexican building. The plaza was also the site of the student demonstrations in 1968 that ended in bloodshed, just before Mexico hosted the Olympic Games.

A little bit of everything

After a quick trip to Mexico City (finally have all my cameras back and in working order), I headed up to Queretaro for the night and just in time to catch some huge rainbows over the city.

On Saturday, we headed to Tepotzotlán, a “pueblo magico” in the state of Mexico, about 40 minutes north of Mexico City. The main attraction is the Museo virreinal that features artifacts and art from the time period when Mexico was occupied by the Spanish. The museum is housed in a church and the adjoining convent. The most spectacular part of the museum is the cathedral and its chapels that are decorated in gold.

After wandering around the church we grabbed lunch in the market….

And then headed to Los Arcos del Sitio, a series of 4 story aqueducts that you can now walk on top of.

After that, we decided to visit the Presa (reservoir) of Taxhimay, where I had seen interesting pictures of kayaking around a church that was flooded and partially covered by water with the creation the reservoir. After driving (we had hired a taxi) on back roads for a while and even crossing over into the state of Hidalgo, we finally arrived at the reservoir. While heavy rains have been frequent in Puebla for over a month, the same has not been true in the state of Mexico. The reservoir was very, very low, leaving the church surrounded by dry soil and no possibility for a kayaking trip. So we took some pictures and headed back to Topotzotlán via a cute town called Villa del Carbon that is located in the middle of a nicely forested area.

The churches looking a little stranded

Sunday morning we hopped a bus to Mexico City and spent the day in the Mueso de Arte Popular (museum of popular art), a famous cantina where Pancho Villa shot a bullet into the ceiling, finally went into the arqueological site that is on the corner of the zocalo.

From the art museum....

Inside of the cantina....

Templo Mayor (right on the corner of the zocalo)

Sunday afternoon in the Alameda