Mexico City Day 2

We knew before arriving to the city that we wanted to visit the Pyramid of the Sun, ruins just outside the city. We woke up early since Eric had a meeting he planned to skype into (seriously, how many people can be on vacation and still get credit for attending a meeting via skype? Well, probably a lot, but I thought this was groovy), so we met at the breakfast area and enjoyed our free breakfast of coffee, juice, toast with jam and fruit while Eric participated in his meeting and I read about the ruins we would visit later on.

It took about an hour to get to the ruins from our hostel. It was interesting seeing the outskirts of the city and how far the residential areas expanded outside the city itself. We got to see parts of the slums from the freeway and if there were any scenes from Man of Fire that closely resembled the City then this area would be it. Nonetheless, we felt safe driving on the freeway. It was a couple bucks to get into the park (5ish?) and we were able to park right up front so our bike would be watched. 

 

Temple of the Sun isn't by any means the most beautiful temple of ruins in Mexico, but it is probably the most important. Apparently this pyramid was Mexico's biggest ancient city and the capital of what was probably the country's pre-Hispanic empire. Set in a dusty, dry and sunny area of Mexico the temple is not the most fabulous of ruins Mexico has to offer, but it is probably the most impressive. Its not hard to tell how vast the city once was with its wide open and long walkways, and the views from the top of each temple offer great views of the surrounding area and even Mexico City on a clear day. We stayed about 2 hours total walking around, climbing temples, and counting numbers of possible uncovered small temples that still remain untouched. 

 Eric looking like a sexier version of Indiana Jones..

 

Afterwards we were both hungry so we headed straight back to our hostel to change and then took a 20 minute walk to a restaurant that I had picked out previously called the Coox Hanal. I knew about this place from tripadvisor as it is supposed to be one of the best restaurants in town, but also because a bartender we had in New Orleans a few weeks before had recommended it over a talk of her travels through Mexico as well. The most popular dish on the menu was lime soup, so we ordered a cup of soup, some tacos with an interestingly breaded shell, and some basic rolled tacos. The soup was fantastic, the breaded tacos were pretty darn good, and the rolled tacos, to be expected, were so so. 

 We parked outside one of the restaurants on the street in front of our hostel as there were no spots left on the road. Later we came home to find a few bikers who thought this was a good idea too. Glad our bike had some company.