CDMX Día 2: Parque Chapultepec, Museo de Arte Moderno, Licorería Limantour

I started Day 2 with a little resistance bands workout. My resistance bands were loops, not the kinds with handles, so I had limited success. But it felt good to stretch and strengthen after the day of travel and the day of walking.

I had to hurry my little stretch and strength training combo because we had an 11am reservation for brunch at a spot that mixed Indian flavors with traditional Mexican cuisine. We walked about 30 minutes to get there, through some really cute neighborhoods. Mexico City is interesting because it’s big and bustling, filled with vegetation. Many of the streets have walkways lined with trees down the middle. The plants are very tropical, even though the air in Mexico City is dry. I was expecting it to be a lot more humid.

The restaurant was really cute – it consisted of a long, thin room that barely allowed for the waiters to pass by the diners on the sides. There were four big tables, that diners shared with other parties.

We got some really amazing food here, and absolutely appreciated the vegetarian options, after all the meat we’d eaten the day before.

After brunch we walked over the Parque de Chapultepec, which is beautiful and sprawling and is the home to a bunch of museums. On Sundays they shut down one of the main thoroughfares in the park for bicyclists, runners and walkers.

We first tried the Museum of Anthropology, but it was free day for nationals and residents so the bag check line was super long and we decided to come back a different day. Instead we walked into the Botanical Gardens, which were very splendid indeed.

The outer gardens had so many different kinds of cacti and succulents. The arrangements were beautiful.

After spending quite some time in the botanical gardens, we decided to try our luck in the Museo de Arte Moderno, which was also in the park but didn’t seem as crowded at the Anthropology Museum. I’m so glad we checked in out, because it was lovely and they had a Pop, Politics and Punk show ending that day.

Check out these domes! I was really impressed by all the museums we saw on our trip. The architecture was always stunning.

The Museo de Arte Moderno also has a sculpture garden, which we lingered in for a while.

The park was filled with vendors selling things, and we did look around for gifts for the kids, but we ended up feeling really overwhelmed and left without buying anything. We were really astonished by how much buying and selling was happening all around us always in Mexico City. The sheer amount of people on the streets selling food and wares was insane. Everywhere you looked someone had set up shop and was hollering about what they could offer.

We left the park to grab a coffee. We went to Chocolatería La Rifa and I got a super yummy mocha. I drank a lot of “mokas” (how they are generally spelled there), but this was one of the best. The shaved chocolate on top of the chocolate whipped cream was especially yummy.

Then we headed to dinner. The walk to coffee was over 30 minutes and the walk to dinner was another 30 minutes. I really enjoyed seeing so much of the city by foot.

Dinner was very good, a kind of modern take on traditional Mexican cuisine. The avacado furikake tostada was especially amazing.

Finally we walked to another one of Mexico City’s great bars – Liquor Limantour. We each had three great drinks and then we spotted something really special at the end of the list – el Orégano – it was so, so good. The waiter said it was his favorite, and the server who brought it to us said it was his favorite. Even the person who picked up the glasses said it was his favorite. So why was it buried at the end of the list?! I’m so glad we tried it, it was so, so good.

On the way home we hit up Orinoco for a second time. This time we got their chicharrón especial and oh man was it special. I’m so glad we went there one more time.

After Orinoco we headed back to the AirBnB to watch a little TV before we passed out from exhaustion. It was another great day, and we were super tired by the end of it.