January 5, 2019 - Mexico City:

Well 5:45 came pretty early!  But we both got everything done in time to go down to breakfast a bit early.  There is a huge buffet with lots of things I can’t identify but sample and love!  There is coffee, hot tea, and hot chocolate to drink and I’m starting slowly with hot tea.  Tomorrow, though, it’s gonna be hot chocolate for sure!

View from our room

We finish breakfast, head upstairs for a few moments, and regroup in the lobby at 8:30 to start our day.  First stop is the National Anthropology Museum.  We get there by van and get a chance to see some more of the city.

The museum is so brilliantly designed that, although it was built in the 1960s, it still looks quite modern.  It utilizes a lot of natural light and has many ways to get to the outside, unlike most museums which feel a bit claustrophobic.  The architect said that there should actually be five individuals involved in the design, each a leader in his field, for example, landscape design.

Juan really displayed his depth of knowledge today.  We learned, or at least had the opportunity to learn, all about Mexico’s history, starting about 2600 years before Christ, or the Modern Era, is you prefer.  We learned about the Olmecs, who were the first people in Mexico, almost certainly having crossed the Bering Straits from Asia.  Then there were the Toltecs, the people of Teotihuacan, who coexisted with the Maya, and the Aztecs, who were conquered by Cortez.

This huge Rain God is a single stone that was transported to the front of the museum.

The Acrobat is for Amanda and Lily!

Recreation of burial sites.

Professor Juan points out which regions were occupied by which groups.

These are the original colors.  This is a snake;  he's a repeated pattern and you can see his tail to his left and the rattles of his neighbor to the right.

This is the Mother!  She gave birth to the moon and starts;  when she became pregnant with the sun, the other children were furious and attacked her.  The sun told her not to worry; he would protect her and when they attacked the sun defeated his siblings.  That's why the Temple of the Sun has the Goddess of the Moon below it.

The tree of life showing the heavens above, the earth, and the underworld

Such amazing stuff!!

Back to the van for a trip to the floating gardens!  They are really flat bottomed boats, usually named for a woman, that are poled up and down a water way!  When we arrive we are each given a rose before we even climb onto our boat.  Along with us, a jewelry salesman hops on as well!  He has a huge case filled with rings, bracelets, and earrings, and he finds a couple of very willing shoppers.  In the meantime, we are passed by smaller boats selling many wares.  The first one to catch our eye is selling buckets of cerveza.  Yay.  While we were in the museum, Adam has bought a variety of sandwiches and a bag of apples for our lunch.  Ginger pays one of the boats with a mariachi band on it to serenade us!  Two of the musicians come aboard while the others stay along side.  They play two songs, the first of which is one that Ginger requested and the second is “Guantanamara”.  Such fun!  There are other boats selling roasted corn on the cob and chayote, flowered headdresses, dolls, candied apples and popcorn, and pulque.  That last one got our attention.  It’s fermented agave, mixed with another fruit like strawberry, guava, or mamey, a Mexican fruit we hadn’t heard of.  That’s the one several of us try and it’s delicious.  The strawberry one is pretty grand too!  And there really isn’t a lot of alcohol in it.

Our boatsman is very adept!  It’s a lot like riding in a bumper car, er, boat!  He hardly ever smashes into any of the other boats and is skillful at maneuvering around them.  He looks to be about twenty or so and says he’s been doing this for twelve years!

Back to the van, and across town again to Coyoacan which used to be a separate town, but is now part of Mexico City.  It turns out that twenty percent of Mexico’s population lives in its capital city!  We have four o’clock tickets to visit Frida Kahlo’s home and museum.  It’s often just called The Blue House.  We’re early enough to check out a lovely park, complete with a busker and a weird statue that seems to be being made by covering an old tree with stucco!  Ginger, Elizabeth, and Barbara all buy beautiful stoles and Ginger gets one for Amy, too.  We see the house that Cortez had built for him, which is now a government building (fittingly enough!) And a lovely church, dedicated to St. John the Baptist.

Buskers are everywhere!

One entrance to Cortez's huge house

The pointsettias are still up from Christmas, until January 6th.

Lollipops!

In the market

The Blue House - sure glad we had tickets already!

Spinners with some of Frida's dresses

Street vendors line every sidewalk!

There are TWO organs in the cathedral!  Juan's son was married here, in the holiest part of the church!  And Juan was with him, of course!

On the way to Frida’s house we walk through the town’s fresh market;  it’s very like the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul.  Now it’s time to queue up for the Frida show.  There are paintings by her and by Diego Rivera, and photographs.  We see her kitchen and dining room and her day bedroom and the night one too, and her studio.  There are lovely gardens and perhaps most interesting is a display of many of her dresses and back braces.

Back to our part of town with a brief stop at the Metropolitan Cathedral of Mexico before returning to the hotel.  We’ve got about an hour before dinner to regroup!  Lickety split and it’s seven o’clock.  We are not the last ones down to the lobby and have time to munch a few of the peanuts waiting there for us!  Then we set off on foot for dinner.  It is such fun to cruise through the crowded main street and check out all the vendors and buskers and people dressed in costumes for you to take their photos.  Just like Vegas!

Juan points out several of the old colonial buildings and takes us into one that was a private home and is now a restaurant.

At one point Ginger and I miss the light and everyone else continues on ahead.  No problem, Ginger knows where we’re going.  Except we sail right on by it and have to ask a man for directions.  We’re heading back in the right direction when Juan calls to check on us.  We’re practically there, and when we arrive Juan is out front waiting for us, so we don’t miss it again!

Meteorites in the lobby of the office building for the geological school

Dinner

We’re upstairs and the place is gorgeous!  We order a sampler plate for everyone to share and most of us have margaritas.  Poor Marilyn is being so good about not eating anything with a lot of points, so she doesn’t have to worry about riding the horses on Mondayl.  She has water and a chicken dish with lots of vegetables.  I have one of the margaritas and a chicken breast with pineapple and sour cream!  It may sound strange;  but it was delicious!  The only problem is that it must have bee a mutant chicken.  No normal chicken has a breast that huge!~

No one can finish their dinner!  Not even Ben and Fred!~  We set out to saunter back, instead of the quick march that sees to be Juan’s preferred pace.  That’s fine until Juan catches up with us and it’s “good-bye” saunter!  Some how, the trip home is much shorter than the way we came!  That’ s really nice!  We drag upstairs and think about packing up in the morning so we can decamp at 8:30.  Onward and upward!!  Tomorrow we climb the pyramids at Teotihuacan!