We woke up around 6am this morning for no particular reason, and immediately got up to have showers. Maman had a hot shower and I had a warm one, which I appreciated because Niina was telling us that she still hasn’t had a warm shower yet. We relaxed in the room until 9:30 when it was time to go up for breakfast.
I sat with Niina and chatted while the food was being brought out. Today they served some really yummy little bean-stuffed tortillas along with yogurt and fruit.
We met some other people today, two girls from Montreal and a couple people from Toronto. There are a ton of Canadians here right now! Niina was going to a museum today so Maman and I decided to go walk to Chapultepec Park (the biggest park in the world) and take the cable car a couple stops to see what it’s like! We headed out after breakfast and our first stop was a bus station for us to buy metro cards.
We then walked to a popular bakery called Panadería Rosetta. We were told we needed to try one of their guava rolls because they’re famous for those. I got an iced latte and a concha, and we shared a guava roll. It was SO GOOD! It was kinda like a croissant dough danish with cream cheese and guava jam in the middle. Definitely worth it!
We moved on from the bakery and continued our walk to Chapultepec park. We walked through the entrance down a large path until we got to Chapultepec Castle. We asked Niina if it was worth the $100 MXN entrance fee, and she said the views were nice when she did it yesterday so we decided to head inside. We ended up paying $10 MXN extra to keep my backpack in a locker (the ticket lady said we couldn’t bring food or drinks inside), but the guy manning the lockers said we could just head up to the castle so we did. We walked up a hill and then we had to get our tickets scanned and bags checked. We were a bit stressed at this point cause we did have some pastries in our bag from the cafe earlier and they were CHECKING. So we hid them as best we could without completely squishing them and walked up to the officials scanning tickets. The guy scanned our tickets, asked me if we had water in our bottles, I said yes, then he just told me to drink it before going inside. We stepped out of line to chug our water, went back to him with our backpack open and ready to be searched because they were checking everything super thoroughly, and he just waved us through without batting an eye! It REALLY pays to speak Spanish here they love us. So after we successfully smuggled food into the castle we were able to look around and it was gorgeous! The inside was a bit museum-like which wasn’t super interesting but the castle itself was beautiful. There were performers practicing for a show on a stage in the courtyard so we watched that for a bit, then we walked around upstairs admiring the gardens and the pretty stained glass windows.
After we’d seen everything we wanted to see, we went back down the hill and continued walking through the park toward the cable car. The park is gorgeous it would be so nice to cycle through! We made it to the Cablebús station and paid $7 MXN to get on. It worked exactly like a metro station, scanning your transportation card at the entrance and then walking up to a platform to get on. We took the cable car a total of 3 stops, it was a really cool way to see the city but I was also a little terrified.
We wanted to stop in at a cafe or something before heading back to the hostel but when we checked the map there seemed to be a lot more around the first cable car stop so we decided to take it straight back without leaving the station at all (also saving another 7 pesos).
Maman found Cafevera only a couple blocks from the cablebús station and it was such a good choice! I ordered a strawberry smoothie and she had a lemonade. The cashier then told us the crepes were on a 2-for-1 special today so we decided to get one caprese crepe and one with strawberries and cream cheese. Everything was great!
At first, I was a bit weirded out because as we were walking up, some lady on the patio was STARING us down, not looking away at all. But then we realized it was a super local place and people were waving and greeting each other on the street so she was probably just surprised to see white people there.
I did some journalling and Maman read her book until we finished our drinks, and we decided to head back around 4:45. At this point, it would have been over an hour to walk back to our hostel and it was going to get dark pretty soon so we decided to take the metro. Maps were telling me we could get back via one subway line with no transfers which sounded pretty good so we walked towards the station.
We had some trouble finding the correct station, we eventually found one for a different line that we could still take, it was just going to be 1 transfer instead of direct. By this point, it was the beginning of rush hour so we were very grateful for the women-and-children-only car. We took it one stop, then had to walk to another station to catch a different line. Once again, we had a ton of trouble finding the correct station. We couldn’t see any signs, find any of the correct busses to take, or get to where google seemed to want us to go at all. On top of it all, we’d accidentally ended up in the Doctores district, which is much more local and a bit sketchier than the areas around our hostel. It was rush hour and sunset was fast approaching so we didn’t want to be left outside for too long. Finally, we were waiting at a bus stop and I was trying to ask a driver if he went to our stop. A local woman advised me that his route was done for the day so he wasn’t going anywhere. I then asked her whether we were waiting at the right place to get back to the hostel and she told me that the section of the line I needed to take had been cancelled! Google obviously didn’t know and had been trying to get me home via a line that no longer runs, so we had been walking around for nothing. I told Maman the news and we decided just to get an Uber at this point, the little adventure had already been mentally exhausting and we just wanted to get home. Our driver Carlos was very good, there was no seatbelt buckle in the car but oh well what can you do. I almost killed a motorcyclist on my way out, I was opening a door on the right-hand side and he was lane-splitting (which I’m still not used to but people do it everywhere here). He came this close 🤏 to hitting my door before I quickly closed it. Whoops.
Anyways we got back to the room fine and by this point I had a massive headache and really didn’t feel well. I’ve been really stuffy the past few days and I think it’s the smog bothering me because as soon as we leave the city on a tour I’m much better. I don’t feel sick otherwise it’s just annoying. I took an advil and just laid on the bed for a while. Niina had told me this morning that she wanted to try a taco place that was recommended by her friend for supper so I let her know we’d be ready to leave around 7:30 or 8. This place was a little further away, a 20min walk, and I almost didn’t go I was really not feeling it. I did find the strength to go after all, though.
We walked to Taquería Orinoco which is a chain that was popularized because Dua Lipa said it was her favourite taco spot in all of Mexico so now it’s famous. Claudia, one of the hostel owners, told us this later. Anyways we got there and there was quite a long line out the door but we figured we’d just wait since we weren’t really in a rush. The line moved super quickly thankfully, and we had the chance to look at the menu while we waited so by the time we got to the counter we knew what we wanted. It was a very fast-food experience, the cashier was miserable and we got a number to take to our table after we’d ordered and paid.
Niina and I shared an agua fresca de jamaica (hibiscus juice kinda) which was yummy, and I had frijoles charros especiales which was basically a bean soup with meat and queso fresco on top. As much as I hate to compliment the Dua-Lipa-hyped fast food chain it was really really good food.
After supper, Maman wanted to get home quickly so she ordered an Uber back to the hostel. We said goodnight to Niina and then proceeded to stay up past midnight even though we need to be up at 4am tomorrow 😭 . It’s for an exciting reason though so we’ll be okay and I can’t wait to tell you all about it!