Mexico City

Our journey from Guadalajara to Mexico city was a breeze as we had inadvertently purchased tickets for an 'Ejectivo' service (Executive coach) and so were treated to ultra comfortable seats, free food and drink, seat back TVs and personalised music choice. It's incredible how upmarket the coach service and network is here but then virtually the whole rail network was shut down in the 1990s so I suppose it needs to be. Whilst our Spanish is undoubtedly improving and we are picking up new words and phrases every day we are a million miles away from being able to understand the 200mph prattling of the locals. This extends to the dubbing of movies so while Kerry sat through the jibbering of a film I sat and listened to some music courtesy of the on-board mp3 player. There was a good choice of music, questionably translated from Spanish into English. I elected not to listen to Verve's "Bitter Swett Shinpony" but did enjoy Madonna and "Like a Payer". Throughout our 7 hour journey we climbed and climbed, from around 1500ft at the outset to 7500ft by the time we got to Mexico city. I remember back in 1999 feeling absolutely awful whilst here, culminating in our bolting for Acapulco for a week before feeling brave enough to tackle the city again. Altitude, pollution and a seething mass of population all contrive to make Mexico city a daunting and challenging place in my opinion and I felt this keenly as we disembarked from the bus and set about locating the hotel we'd booked online the day before. We feel the same every time we arrive somewhere new: vulnerable, wary, confused, irritated by our bags, desperate not to be the victims of a scam or ripped off in any way. Within 24 hours though that all melts away and we feel confident and secure in our surroundings. It's a strange one. We took a taxi from the bus station to our hotel, a 45 minute ride through a monsoon and gridlocked streets for the princely sum of £4. The rain sheeted down such that within 10 minutes of it starting the water level was above the curbs and the roads resembled rivers. Given that Mexico city is built on a lake anyway and seeing rain like this it's no wonder that many buildings are what could colloquially be described as 'on the piss'. Many buildings resemble Pisa's finest and a visit here must be a terribly upsetting experience for those with OCD or technical drawers or anyone else who likes everything just so. Because of the dreadful weather we ate in the restaurant next door to our hotel that first night and managed to make utter fools of ourselves in the process. Dressed in combat trousers, tee shirts and kagoules we were shown to our table having first given our names and our hotel (?) to realise that everyone else was swankily attired, hombres suited and booted and senoras in their finery. Our damp barnets completed our bedraggled look, the fact that we gorged on bread before the meal arrived as we were so hungry meant we barely touched our obscenely sized meals and another bout of "Moctezuma's revenge" once back in the room for me completed our sorry excursion. I think I've already mentioned, all but 6 of my previous days spent in Mehico could best be described as a "latrine-fest" so I was relieved that this bout was reasonably short-lived, though long enough to realise that, with a bit of imagination, I could see monkeys, cows and a chap with a moustache in the patterns in the floor tiles of our bathroom. On Saturday we ventured out, firstly to the Zocalo, the main square of the city. It's an arresting sight as you emerge into the daylight from the metro with majestic colonial buildings on all sides. The Spanish certainly knew how to build an awe-inspiring city, though of course what they razed to the ground in order to build the capital of new Spain would be a much greater thing to behold. With years of traffic belching out exhaust fumes most of the buildings in the city are coated in detritus and have a dark pallor and this somehow adds to their visual appeal. The cathedral which dominates the zocalo is probably the most noteworthy structure but whichever direction you look in you are in for a treat. We went inside the cathedral and whilst I'm not religious in any way I always find it a fascinating experience in such places. For starters the architecture is generally magnificent and it's interesting to see how different people behave. We saw everything from indifference to a middle-aged man on his knees, tugging at the skirts of an elderly woman in a dinner lady apron and weeping gratitude for some sort of blessing she had bestowed upon him. A part of me wishes I understood all this, though I doubt I ever will. With the Christian box ticked we next sought to redress the balance by visiting what's left of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. When Hernan Cortes arrived in Tenochtitlan in 1519 he would have been greeted by the fabulous sight of a city bigger than anything in his native Spain, gleaming white with alabaster and apparently floating on lake Texcoco with causeways to the mainland. Surely in awe that such a culture had flourished in isolation from the known world, he nevertheless set in motion its destruction. A few hundred Spaniards, together with their horses, muskets and the help of some disaffected rival tribes had effectively brought down the empire by 1521 and begun the process of converting millions of natives to Catholicism and to swear allegiance to the king of Spain. Due to the relish with which the Conquistadors took to their task there is little left of Tenochtitlan but the "Templo Mayor" (great temple) has been excavated and its ruins provide a fascinating glimpse of what once was. The rest of it is lost beneath the current city and what artifacts have been recovered are in museums. This is no Rome! We took in the football over lunch on Saturday but Spain bore me to tears and the only bright spot was that they knocked the whingeing French out. The restaurant staff managed to amaze us with their insouciance and general disdain for us. My order for a coffee at one point was greeted with nothing but a smirk and with nothing forthcoming I asked the waiter again only for him to turn on his heel without uttering a word. I appreciate our Spanish is limited but there is no mistaking 'cafe con leche' so he was obviously just being an ignorant arse. As I mentioned last time, they don't like us and it is sometimes uncomfortable. Sunday was largely a day off for us though we did of course need to watch what would hopefully be England's glorious passage into the semi finals of Euro 2012. Fate conspired for us to watch the game in an Italian cafe which wasn't too bad a thing until a party of Italy supporting Mexicans came in at the start of extra time. It was hard enough to stomach our pitiful showing on the pitch, more so to be witness to more shoot - out woe (I was 26 the last time we won a penalty shoot-out!) but to also be mocked by Eye-tie Mexicans was too much. I watched England lose on penalties to Portugal in Gelsenkirchen in 2006 surrounded in the crowd by Portu-geezers. To a man they all offered me a handshake and commiserated with me before commencing their celebrations which was a great touch. There was no such decorum from these ignorami. With mood low we walked back to our hotel via the stunning Palacio Des Bellas Artes and were caught in another monsoon of almost biblical proportions. Kerry had realised just this morning that she had misplaced her kagoule somewhere so to protect her from the elements we invested 75p in a very fetching floor length water proof smock. It is as aesthetically pleasing, and as functional, as a bin bag. Monday was the first of 3 days where we knew we had to get up, get out and crack on and on today's agenda was Teotihuacan. For those of you interested in your Mexican history Teotihuacan was the first great culture in central Mexico, building a magnificent city 40 miles north of present day Mexico city with eventually around 125000 inhabitants. They worshipped pagan gods of rain, the sun, the underworld and believed in the cult of Quetzalcoatl; that a white and bearded 'god' had civilised them in the mists of time and then sailed across the Ocean to the east on a raft of serpents. (As you do). Teotihuacan is almost 2000 years old but is still in great condition and it's 2 main pyramids perfectly intact. They were a job to climb. The onset of middle age, the rarefied air and the paunches we have accumulated courtesy of the USA meant it was a bit of a breathless endeavour to climb all 248 steps and even harder for some of us to get down. Should there be such a thing as reincarnation it is doubtful that Kerry will return as a mountain goat. Since arriving in Mexico 3 or 4 weeks ago we have barely encountered any gringos and virtually no English speakers. We got chatting to an American-Chinaman at the top of the pyramid of the moon and it was so good to speak English to someone other than each other that we wanted to hug him. Returning to the city we caught the tube to Guadalupe to visit the famous church there. The church is built on the site where a miracle occurred in 1527. A local chap saw the virgin Mary on 4 separate occasions here, an event that went a long way to convincing the heathen savages that Catholicism truly was the way forward. Convenient? You decide. Regardless of all that the belief here is strong and people approaching the cathedral on their knees is testimony to that. We were fortunate to witness some sort of service after which 4 life-sized representations of Mary were taken outside into the sun and people queued up to pray to them. (and you think I'm mental for seeing cows in my bathroom floor) On Tuesday we visited Xochimilco, a southern suburb which has a network of canals on which you can travel on colourful boats. It's a tremendously peaceful escape from the hubbub in the city and with some boats transporting mariachi bands you are treated to the distant sounds of their music as you float lazily along. There's a slightly morbid point where a local guy fished dolls out of the water and strung them up in the trees in honour of a young girl who drowned in the canal. The other low point for me was our stopping at a canal-side garden centre and being offered the 'opportunity' to go and have a look at the plants. I politely declined and stayed on-board and talked about football with our oarsman. On the train to Xochimilco we passed the Azteca stadium and, like the tremendously accommodating travel partner that she is, Kerry agreed that it would be a great way to spend an hour or so by having a guided tour of the stadium. Hand of God, Pele 1970, Lineker's header, Maradona's 2nd goal-they all happened here and for me the stadium is synonymous with my O levels - I was watching Mexico 86 when I should have been revising. We met some nice Colombians on our tour (I think I told the lady that I was Colombian but I'm sure she understood I meant 'are you Colombian?') and our guide was a good egg too so overall it was a pleasant interlude. On Wednesday we took a bus tour of the city on one of the hop on - hop off buses and also spent the afternoon at the Museo de Antropologica. The museum houses some truly fantastic exhibits but perhaps none more so than the Aztec sun stone, a gigantic stone disk carved with all manner of intricacies. Outside the museum we watched a troop of voladores (flying men) perform in a spectacle which sees them climb a 100ft pole, sit atop a rickety wooden platform at the very top and then return to the ground by means of gradually unwinding a rope which is tied around their waist. If you suffer from even the mildest vertigo just watching them climb the pole is enough to make you have an egg but it's great entertainment. After a bit of a mix up on the tour buses we finally got back home and prepared for the next leg. I write from the Mexico city to Acapulco bus and I sincerely hope the weather turns soon. Can't say there's much chance we'll be 'going loco' in the pouring rain! Lastly, a word about my travel partner. We're now 2 and a half months in and there hasn't been so much as a crossed word between us. This is miraculous as well as fortunate. It wouldn't be much fun if I were out here with some sour-faced baggage so Kerry, thank you for being so easy to spend 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with.