Mexico - Day 2

The posts continue on my trip to Mexico. Here is a summary of Day 2. We had breakfast at our hotel in Mexico City and then loaded a bus to be transported to another part of the city to begin our walking tour. We visited the Plaza of Three Cultures, the Basilica of Guadalupe, had lunch at the House of Tiles, visited the Templo Mayor museum, and then in late afternoon took an hour-long bus ride through the mountains to Cuernavaca, the town where we would spend the next four days. We had a wonderful Mexican supper in the garden of the Cemenhuac language school, who coordinated much of our visit to Mexico.

Me on the balcony of my hotel room in Mexico City

Our trusty guide for the day, Martin.

The cathedral at the Plaza of Three Cultures. You can see the architectural work of three different cultures: ancient Aztec, colonial Spanish, and traditional Mexican. (thanks to Megan for explaining that so well - I stole that phrase from her.)

Some walls of pyramids at the Plaza of Three Cultures. Whenever a new ruler would take over, he would build a new bigger, better, and larger pyramid over the pyramid of the former ruler. You can see the partially reconstructed walls of four different pyramids in this picture. It was so interesting to think about how these people lived, and all the (likely slave) labor that went into building these large structures.

The crowd at the Basilaca of Guadalupe on Sunday morning. Mexico is largely Catholic so many people come here for mass or for many other reasons. We saw many families here, probably because it was a holiday weekend.

Inside the Chapel of the Virgin of Guadalupe. There were several chapels/churches/cathedrals on the grounds and I am having a hard time remembering the significance of each. I know this one was very small and was built on the location where legend says that Juan Diego actually saw a vision of the Virgin of Guadalupe. They were having a mass while we were in there so it was very full.

The view from the chapel. The turquoise colored roof on the left is the new large Basilica of Guadalupe.

This is the old Basilica building. If you look closely you will see that it looks like this building is actually leaning forward. It is! Most of Mexico City was built on a lake, and large, older, very heavy buildings like this one are actually sinking into the lake bed. You can't go in the building anymore.

A group shot on the Basilica grounds. We were missing two people who were wandering around somewhere. Our leader, Del Good is on the far right.

A man selling fresh pineapples, and pineapple juice in a street median.

The waitresses at The House of Tiles, where we ate lunch, had very interesting outfits!

The royal palace - doorway and presidential balcony. Notice the armed guards standing in the doorway. The palace was closed because of a protest going on downtown, so we couldn't go in.

Me in front of Templo Mayor, another archaeological sight that we went to. This one was closer to downtown Mexico City, and much more of this kind of thing remains buried below Mexico City.

That is not even all of my pictures from Day 2 - but this post is long enough! I will post more of our drive to Cuernavaca soon!