Mexico City - Part 2

From Mexico City Zócalo

After a foray far outside Mexico city, we spent the next day mostly within the limits of the Mexican Federal District. We started the day with a visit to the National Palace, the seat of the Mexican government, the main attraction of which is a set of murals painted by a weird guy called Diego Rivera. The picture above is the inner courtyard within the national palace, which looked very nice under the light conditions we had in the morning. Now, one of the strangest requirements in visiting this place, is that they ban the entry of camera tripods (!?), duly searched for by a metal detector on you and by an airport style luggage scanner. I guess they thought I would be as deadly as Jason Bourne with it, but I bet that they did not realize that Bourne is specialized in fighting with literature and stationery.

From Museo Nacional de Antropología

Our next stop was the national museum of anthropology, which sports an outstanding collection of items from pretty much all pre-colombian civilizations dwelling in the Mexico region. Unfortunately, our tour only included the Aztec section of the museum, and for a relatively short period of time. I have to admit that it was a fine museum, well beyond my expectations, and I regret not being able to spend the same amount of time I would normally like to. The picture above is of Ana and I in front of the original Aztec calendar stone that was dug up from the city center, and subsequently shot at by the Americans invading Mexico (hence its pockmarks).

Next, we moved on to Xochimilco, a borough of Mexico City which contains a network of canals where little boats called Trajineras make food-fueled tours. Besides staying in the boat itself, we had plenty of other "modular" attractions, with all sorts of tradesmen floating about in their own boats offering from more food to on-the-spot music by Mariachis on boats. All boats seemed to have names, and ours was called Lupita, as you can see from the picture below.

From Xochimilco