28Dec13
We went full-on tourist and followed some Lonely Planet recommendations. The main event was Plaza Garibaldi, where mariachi bands roam and which Lonely Planet describes as “notoriously seedy” but is also the recipient of “a recent makeover.” They also call it one of their top choices when visiting Mexico City, so we decided to make a night of it.
Here’s a quick video so you can take it in:
It’s a couple blocks away from the Garibaldi metro station and near a big food mercado, which is where we decided to have dinner. It’s a long hallway with probably 20-25 small restaurants that all looked good. We picked one and some other gringos saw us and decided to follow suit. If they only knew, we have no idea what we’re doing either.
All around the plaza there are restaurants and bars too, although I suspect they’re expensive. That’s also where the Museum of Tequila and Mezcal is — and it’s open very late — but we couldn’t bring ourselves to do it and preferred to just have a seat in the plaza.
Anyhow, we got wrangled into buying a few songs, and I even got a dance with the guitarist. If we could do it again, we would have been firmer about the number of songs — they’re not cheap! 80 pesos each — but there were six guys and when are we ever going to do this again.
Keeping with the tourist theme, we ate at El Hidalguense for lunch where we saw many other gringos. We saw more gringos today than during our entire month here! The food was good — they’re known for their barbacoa. But the real highlight was I got a much better recording of my favorite amplified announcer woman as the truck drove by the restaurant.
We’ll miss hearing her voice!
