Mexico City - Highlights Around Town
Mexico City, being one of the largest cities in the world, practically has too many attractions to list! From parks to Pre-hispanic sites, there is something for everybody!
Public transport are readily available. The buses are good and the Metro in the city is a nice way to get around. Even taxis still carry you around for a relatively small fee.
Mexico City is huge. Arriving travellers (and your visitors!) may wish to spend the first few days outside this monster city.
Puebla is a good start. To get there, Estrella Roja runs a luxury bus service every twenty minutes directly from the airport to either the CAPU or 4 Poniente terminals in Puebla. It takes two hours. It's cheap, safe and reliable. You get to pass by Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl.
In Puebla try mixiotes at El Gallo (Av. Puebla Tlaxcala 303 La Maria, Puebla). They claim are the real McCoy!
For the uninitiated, mixiotes are the quite tough outer membranes of young Maguey plant leaves (Maguey is also known as the Agave or the Century Plant), which are removed in sheets and used to wrap little bundles of marinated meats and chiles. The bundle is then steamed as you would a tamale (a steam-cooked corn dough (masa) with or without a filling which uses corn husk or plantain leaves for the wrap). Nowadays they are substituted with banana leaves, or parchment paper. In Mexico the use of the Maguey was stopped by law because stripping the young leaves killed the plant and the plant population was being decimated. Mixiotes refers to the name of the plant membrane as well as the dish.
For the adventurous types there are expedtions of white water rafting.
For botanists a sight not to be missed is that of The Floating Gardens of Xochimilco, which date back to Aztec times.