My 4 Days In Mexico City, Mexico, Counted In Cobbles And Copal Smoke

I went to Mexico City with a very loose plan and came back with a very specific one. Four days is not enough to see the city. It is enough to feel its shape, which turns out to be the point. The historic center, then Chapultepec and Roma, then out to Teotihuacán, then a slow Coyoacán day. That is the rhythm that worked.

I used to plan trips like this for other people back when I was a travel agent, so I care about the seams. How you get from one stop to the next. What time you should show up. When to book ahead and when to just walk in. This itinerary is written that way, in first person, with actual timings and how I moved between places.

Bring good shoes. Bring cash for museum entries and market snacks. Do not rent a car in the center.

Day 1, The Historic Center on Foot

Day 1 is the Centro Histórico, all of it, on foot. I started at the Zócalo before the crowds thickened and worked outward in a rough loop, cathedral, ruins, long lunch, palace, tower. Nothing here is more than a fifteen minute walk from the last thing. Wear real shoes.

Zócalo, Constitution Plaza

I started early, around 8 in the morning, with a coffee in my hand and the flag ceremony still fresh on the stones. The Zócalo is huge in a way photos do not capture, one of the largest public squares in the world, and at that hour it belongs to the traditional dancers setting up with drums and copal smoke rather than the tour groups. The Aztec dancers in feathered headdresses are not a show for tourists, they are there most mornings.

Give it forty five minutes. Walk the whole perimeter once to orient yourself. The National Palace with the Rivera murals is on the east side and is free if you bring ID, and the Templo Mayor entrance is tucked to the northeast on Calle Seminario. I skipped street food this early. From here it is a two minute walk across the square to the cathedral.

Metropolitan Cathedral

By 9 you can walk right in. This is the largest cathedral in Latin America, built over almost 250 years on top of the main Aztec temple, using some of the same stones. You feel that immediately. The floor is not level. Walk toward the Altar de los Reyes at the back, the churrigueresque gold one, and look down at your feet as you go, the whole cathedral is slowly sinking into the old lakebed and it shows.

Give it thirty minutes if you are moving, an hour if you like the side chapels. Fourteen of them, most dripping with gold leaf. Skip the bell tower unless the light is very clear, the view is better from Torre Latinoamericana later. From the cathedral door it is a two minute walk east to the Templo Mayor entrance on Seminario.

Templo Mayor

Just past 10, and this is the one that hits hardest. You are standing inside the ruins of the main Aztec temple of Tenochtitlan while modern Mexico City honks around you. The eagle warrior pieces, the serpent heads, the layered pyramid stages where they kept building bigger versions on top of older ones, all of it out in the open, feet from the cathedral.

Entry is 210 pesos for foreign visitors. The museum attached to the ruins is superb, ceremonial masks, tzompantli skull rack context, and the enormous Coyolxauhqui stone. Plan an hour and a half if you read the signage, which is mostly Spanish so bring your translator app. From the exit gate on Seminario it is about a seven minute walk northwest through the pedestrian streets to Café de Tacuba on Calle de Tacuba 28.

Café de Tacuba

Around 12:30 for lunch and the room does the heavy lifting before the food arrives. Painted tiles, murals, mariachis, and a lady walking through with a basket of pan dulce. This restaurant has been open 113 years and it refuses to modernize.

I had the mole con pollo and it was the real thing, complex, layered, nothing like the jarred version. The tamale did nothing for me. Order a Tacuba cocktail, jamaica and mezcal, and one of the sampler platters if you are two people. Expect to spend about ninety minutes here, it is not a fast lunch. Skip if you hate unsolicited live music, that is not a joke.

Walk it off westward for about ten minutes along Tacuba to reach Bellas Artes.

Palacio de Bellas Artes

Around 2:30, when the sun is high and the white marble is almost blinding. Art nouveau on the outside, art deco inside, and the Diego Rivera murals in the lobby are the reason to go in. Entry is 95 pesos and worth every one. You cannot bring water or food inside, and only backpacks get bag check.

Give it an hour for the interior. If you are attending a performance in the theater, the Tiffany stained glass curtain of the Valley of Mexico is one of the more remarkable things I have seen in a theater anywhere. For the postcard shot of the dome, cross Eje Central and take the elevator to the eighth floor of Sears, order a coffee, and shoot from the café window. That is where every good photo comes from.

From Sears it is a three minute walk south to Torre Latinoamericana.

Torre Latinoamericana at Sundown

Around 6, when the sun starts going. Torre Latinoamericana is the mid-century tower right at the corner of Eje Central and Madero, and its 44th floor observation deck gives you the whole city at once. Cathedral, Bellas Artes dome, Reforma, the endless valley pressed up against the mountains. Go at golden hour.

Give it forty five minutes on the deck. Buy tickets at the ground floor lobby, elevator up, then take the little staircase to the open air section at the top for the real view. It gets breezy up there, bring a light layer.

Day 1 ends here. From the tower it is a ten minute walk or a five minute Uber back to any hotel in Centro or Roma. I walked, slowly, past the taquerías firing up for the evening.

Day 2, Chapultepec and Roma

Day 2 swings west. Mornings for Chapultepec, its huge museum and the castle on the hill, then a late lunch in Roma, an afternoon park sit, dinner in Polanco, and cocktails back in Roma to close it out. Metro and short Ubers, no rental car.

Museo Nacional de Antropología

Day 2 began at 9 sharp at the museum entrance on Reforma, and you should too. The line grows fast and the exhibits get crowded by 11. Take the metro to Auditorio or Chapultepec, it is a five to eight minute walk in through the park, and you will hear the Voladores de Papantla drumming before you see the pole.

Ticket is around 100 pesos. Do the lower floor first, Mexica hall with the Piedra del Sol is the anchor, then Maya, Oaxaca, Teotihuacán. Upstairs is ethnography. It is enormous. Plan two and a half hours minimum, and skip a room rather than rush. Bags larger than a small purse go in the locker room, not with you.

From the museum exit, walk about fifteen minutes south through Chapultepec park to reach the base of the castle hill.

Chapultepec Castle

Just past noon. Buy your ticket at the kiosk at the base, then walk up. The uphill is real, curving, maybe ten minutes at a comfortable pace, with shade. This is the only castle in North America that housed European royalty, Maximilian and Carlota, and their preserved rooms are the highlight along with the stained glass corridor upstairs.

Give it ninety minutes. The rooftop gardens and terraces have the best long view of Reforma, straight down the avenue toward the Angel of Independence. Signs are mostly Spanish, use your phone.

Come back down the same path and grab a quick fifteen minute Uber over to Roma Norte for lunch at Contramar on Durango 200. Reservations for Contramar are usually needed weeks in advance, book before your trip.

Contramar

Around 2:30, the Mexico City lunch hour, which is the only time Contramar makes sense. The dining room is bright, loud, and full of people staying for three hours. Order the tuna tostadas, the whole pescado a la talla split red and green, and a passion fruit meringue pie at the end. This is the meal.

The tuna tostadas are the item everyone talks about and they earn it. The service moves quickly once you are seated. I spent about two hours and could have stayed longer.

It is expensive by CDMX standards but not by any other standards. Around 1200 to 1500 pesos per person with drinks.

From Contramar it is a seven minute walk south into the middle of the Condesa loop to reach Parque México.

Parque México

Just after 5, and this is the one place on Day 2 that is not a museum or a restaurant. Parque México sits in the middle of the old Hipódromo racetrack loop in Condesa, oval-shaped, art deco benches, a little bandstand, dogs everywhere.

Give it thirty to forty five minutes. Sit. Watch. This is where CDMX comes to walk its dogs and eat an ice cream after work, and it is the antidote to a museum-heavy day. There is a small kiosk on the north side for a coffee if you need one.

From the park it is a ten minute Uber north to Polanco for dinner at Pujol. Do not walk it, it is uphill and long.

Pujol

Book Pujol months out. I got a 7 pm slot on a Tuesday and it took two attempts. The room is calm and low, with a live tree growing up through the roof and a pianist in the corner. Service uses your name from the first minute.

The tasting menu is the reason to come and the mole madre, mole nuevo, aged for years and served with a fresh ring of new mole, is the reason you remember it. The baby corn with chicatana ant mayo is the other one people talk about, and it is as good as they say. A couple of the mid-courses were less impressive than the price implies, I will say that honestly.

Plan two and a half hours. It is a splurge dinner. From Pujol grab a fifteen minute Uber back to Roma Norte for one nightcap.

Licorería Limantour

Around 10:30 pm, later if Pujol runs long. Limantour is on Álvaro Obregón in Roma Norte, an art deco two story bar that stays on the world’s fifty best list year after year. Book a table through their site or arrive early and take a bar seat.

Order the Margarita al Pastor, the one made with pineapple, cilantro, and chile that tastes like a taco al pastor in glass form. Then a Mexican Old Fashioned. Give it an hour. Upstairs is quieter if you want to talk.

Day 2 wraps here. Roma Norte is walkable back to any nearby hotel, and Ubers are cheap and quick if you are staying further out.

Day 3, Teotihuacán and the Basilica

Day 3 leaves the city. I hired a driver for the day, which I usually do not do, but for Teotihuacán it made the whole thing simpler. Pyramids at sunrise, lunch inside a cave, then the Basilica on the way back into town.

Teotihuacán at Sunrise

Day 3 started at 6 am with a driver picking me up from my hotel. Teotihuacán is about an hour northeast of the city, and you want to be at Gate 1 by 7:30 when it opens. Cool air, blue sky, hot air balloons drifting over the Pyramid of the Sun. This is when the site is magic. By 10 the tour buses arrive and the light is flat.

Entry is 90 pesos, cash only at Gate 1. Bring water, sunscreen, a hat. Walk the Avenue of the Dead from the Pyramid of the Moon down to the Pyramid of the Sun, then loop back through the Palace of Quetzalpapálotl. Plan two and a half to three hours on the site, more if you climb.

From the pyramids it is a five minute drive over to La Gruta for lunch.

La Gruta

Around noon, right after the pyramids. La Gruta has been open since 1906 and it is exactly what it sounds like, a full restaurant built inside a natural volcanic cave, steps from the Pyramid of the Sun. The temperature drops the second you walk down the stairs. It is dim, cool, cathedral-tall, and completely different from anything else you will eat on this trip.

The food is traditional Mexican, some pre-Hispanic dishes if you want to try escamoles or grasshoppers. I had the barbacoa and it was solid. Get the frozen tamarind margarita, that is what you are here for along with the room. Reservations recommended, especially between noon and 2.

Plan an hour and a half. After lunch, drive about an hour back toward the city and stop at the Basilica of Guadalupe on the way in.

Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe

Around 4 pm, on the way back into town from Teotihuacán. The Basilica sits at the foot of Tepeyac Hill in the north of the city, and the complex is much larger than one church. There is the old sinking basilica from the 1700s tilting visibly to one side, and the modern circular basilica built in 1976 to hold the crowds, with a moving walkway that carries you slowly past the original tilma of Juan Diego.

Dress respectfully, no hats inside, shoulders covered. Entry is free. Give it an hour, longer if you walk up Tepeyac Hill for the view over the plaza.

This is where Day 3 ends. From the Basilica take a twenty minute Uber back to your hotel. It is a heavy day. Eat something small and sleep.

Day 4, Coyoacán and San Ángel

Last day is the southern neighborhoods, and it is my favorite day. Coyoacán is cobbled, leafy, and full of people who live there. San Ángel has the good garden restaurants and the Rivera studio. I moved slower on this day on purpose.

Casa Azul, the Frida Kahlo Museum

Day 4 began around 10 am in Coyoacán, on Londres 247, at the blue house where Frida Kahlo was born, lived with Diego Rivera, and died. Book your ticket weeks ahead, they are timed entry and they sell out. Really.

Walk the studio upstairs first, then her bedroom and the day bed with the mirror above it, then the courtyard garden with the pyramid Diego built for her pre-Hispanic collection. Photos are allowed in the garden and courtyard, not in the rooms. Plan an hour to an hour and fifteen minutes.

It is intimate, quiet, and full of her actual things, her paints, her wheelchair, her jewelry laid out on the dresser. From Casa Azul it is a six minute walk south through pretty tree-lined streets to Jardín Centenario in the heart of old Coyoacán.

Jardín Centenario

Just before noon. Jardín Centenario is the small twin plaza to Coyoacán’s main square, with the two coyote fountain at its center, jacaranda trees, and cafés spilling out under the arches. Sit for a coffee. Watch the balloon vendors and the dogs. This is the Coyoacán people move here for.

Give it thirty minutes. There is nothing to do here in the museum sense, that is the point. If it is a weekend, the indigenous crafts market spreads out along the edges and the whole square gets more lively.

From Jardín Centenario, take a ten minute Uber west over to San Ángel for lunch at San Ángel Inn.

San Ángel Inn

Around 1:30, walking into a 17th century hacienda that used to be a Carmelite monastery. Ask for a table on the garden terrace, that is where the magic is, tiled fountains and bougainvillea and a courtyard that feels like it belongs to another century.

Order the sopa azteca and the chiles en nogada if they are in season, roughly July through September. The margaritas come out on silver trays. Prices are on the high end for CDMX and I think the room does more work than the plate, but the room does a lot of work. Give it about ninety minutes.

From San Ángel Inn take a ten minute Uber back east to Coyoacán for the afternoon market.

Mercado de Coyoacán

Around 4 pm, when the market has hit its afternoon rhythm. Coyoacán Market dates to 1921 and it is a two story maze of stalls, fresh chiles hanging in strings, mole pastes in tubs, blue corn quesadilla stands, and the famous Tostadas Coyoacán counter with mountains of pulpo, tinga, and ceviche piled high.

Get a tostada. Get a fresh mango smoothie. Wander upstairs for handmade textiles and Day of the Dead crafts even in June. Give it forty five minutes to an hour. Cash makes everything faster.

Do not touch merchandise you are not buying and ask before photographing stalls, that is normal courtesy here.

From the market, take an eight minute Uber west to San Ángel for the last stop.

Museo Casa Estudio Diego Rivera y Frida Kahlo

Around 5:30 for the last visit of the trip. This is not the Casa Azul, this is the other one, two functionalist houses in San Ángel connected by a small rooftop bridge, designed by Juan O’Gorman in 1932 as separate studios for Diego and Frida. Blue house for him. Small pink house for her.

Tickets are cheap, around 40 pesos, and you can usually walk in without a reservation, which is rare in this city. Give it forty five minutes. The architecture is the point, tall studio windows for Diego’s mural work, a cactus fence around the property, and the bridge itself, which tells you everything about their marriage without a single label.

And that is Day 4. From here it is a fifteen minute Uber back north to the center, or a longer slow walk if the evening light is good. I chose the walk.

Four days went fast. I left with a notebook full of stall names, a small bag of dried chiles, and the beginning of a recipe I am still working on at home. If you have done this trip differently, tell me what you would swap in. I am already thinking about a fifth day.

Safe travels, and eat the tostada.