Where with 2400 meters of altitude the town of Mexico City is spread out today, there extended is 500 years the lake Texcoco where on an island sumptuous Tenochtitlan was built, capital of the Aztec empire. Of this gradually drained lake there remain practically only the gardens of Xochimilco.
Today, true megalopolis being stretched on nearly 2000 km ², Mexico City became, with its 20 million inhabitants, one of the most populated cities and noisiest of the world. But Ciudad de México, centers government and life commercial, financial, intellectual and artistic of the country, can fascinate the visitors by its many historical and cultural treasures, like by its great vitality and the charms of some of its districts.

Tourist attractions:
El Zocalo
This immense very successful place is the center of the town of Mexico City, it bears this name (the base) because of a base intended to carry the statue of a historical personality. Obviously, this one cannot be given, and the base remained unoccupied. This central place was thus called “base”. It always formed the heart of the city since it constituted already that of Tenochtitlan, then carrying in its center Teocalli, the principal temple of the Aztec ones.

The cathedral
Zocalo is dominated by the cathedral, the second of America in dimensions. It was started in 1573 and was only completed 250 years later. By this fact, it combines the styles baroque and rebirth.

The National Palate
He also located on Zocalo, it was built on the site of the palate of Moctezuma, in 1523 on the order of Cortés. This imposing building, with its 14 course interior, shelters many artistic treasures of the colonial time. It is necessary to see especially there the epic frescos of the Mexican painter Diego Rivera who, in sixteen years, painted on 450 m ² the history of Mexico.
It is since the balcony of the national palate, that the president shouts each September 15, national feastday, the same words as the Hidalgo Father in 1810 in the village of Dolores: “Mexican, Mexico lives! ”

If one visits one museum during his stay in Mexico, it must be Museo Nacional de Antropología. This absolutely superb museum shelters an important collection of priceless treasures coming from archeological sites distributed through Mexico like some exposures. You will see there outstanding objects of the prehispanic period like, for example, the Aztec calendar out of stone and of Maya paintings of the site of Bonampak.

Near Palacio de Belles Artes is Parks it Alameda, one of the most pleasant parks of Mexico, arranged according to a simple geometrical concept. Approximately 2 km more in the west, last Paseo of Reformed, an important and elegant boulevard by places, you will enter the shingles rosa, a district of tourist with very many hotels, restaurants, shops and nightclubs. By carrying on your way along Paseo of Reformed, you will discover Bosque de Chapultepec, an immense park with thickets, ponds, gardens flowered, zoological garden and several museums.

Another sector of the south of the city which offers a particular environment is Coyoacán, residential an old working which was formerly an independent village. There, you will be able joyeusement to stroll on two pretty great places, one vis-a-vis the other, very animated day and evening.
Around these places, like on the neighbouring streets, you will find a selection interesting of restaurants of which some with terrace as well as bars, coffees, stores and shops, without forgetting a government contract.

For the night life, another place to be suggested is Plaza Garibaldi, to a few hundred meters in the north of Palacio de Bellas Artes. On the place itself, like in the many bars and restaurants which surround it, of the mariachis walk and offer their songs on request.

In the surroundings of Mexico City:
Teotihuacan
With 50 kilometers of Mexico City, Teotihuacan (the place of the gods) was built is given up by unknown people. The site was occupied as of 600 front J. - C. the monumental city, set up towards 200 front J. - C., reached the surface of 20 km ² (what made the largest méso-American city of it) while its population exceeded the 200.000 inhabitants.