Mexico is a traveler's dream. Whatever your pleasure - bustling cities, historic villages, lush jungles, imposing mountains, crystal white beaches that line azure blue seas, or the mysteries of the past - Mexico is sure to please. Often stereotyped by those who really don't know it, Mexico offers everything from world class accommodations and entertainment, to budget trips for the thrifty and adventurous. Mexico hotels offer the same wide variety: penthouse suites with ocean views to small rooms with a shared bath. The better hotels in Mexico all have bilingual staffs so your command of Spanish does not have to be perfect.
Mexico City is one of the largest cities in the world. Mexico's best and worst ingredients are all here: music and noise, brown air and green parks, colonial palaces and skyscrapers, world-renowned museums and ever-spreading slums. The city's historic centre is the Plaza de la Constitucian, or Zacalo. The plaza was paved in the 1520s by Hernan Cortas, using stones from the temples and palaces of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlin he'd destroyed, and on which Mexico City was built.
Guadalajara, the country's second-largest city, is the source of many Mexican traditions: mariachi music, tequila, the Mexican Hat Dance, broad-brimmed sombrero hats and the Mexican rodeo. The lovely city has many of the attractions of Mexico City - a vibrant culture, fine museums and galleries, handsome historic buildings, exciting nightlife and good places to stay and eat - but few of the capital's problems. Highlights include the giant, twin-towered cathedral and the lovely plazas that surround it, the Instituto Cultural de Cabanas and its frescoes by Jose Clemente Orozco, the Plaza de los Mariachis and the market towns of Tlaquepaque and Tonala. more...
