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Topic: vacation destination suggestions
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| chucho | Posted – 6/17/2008 9:04:29 AM | show profile I do definitely recommend taking precautions -- esp. regarding debit and (worse) credit cards when in DF or any other large, chaotic city in the developing world. I say CCs are worse because when some guy is threatening to break your fingers until you provide a PIN number, he may not beleive you if you say you don't have a PIN number for your credit card to withdraw cash. But in any case, as far as recommendations -- DF is a wonderful, horrible place but not very many travelers I think would like to spend any times there. I definitely think Mexico is a great option, but you go to Oaxaca City, or the Yucatan or Pto. Escondido or Zihuatenejo or Patzcuaro, or Michoacan, or Jalisco, or Mazatlan, or Hidalgo, or the Copper Canyon tour, etc. The further away from the typical tourist places the more your money will last, which is why I recommend going to: Pacific Coast of Chiapas (close enough to Ziploite that the hippies and other dopehead crunchies stay clustered up there and Huatulco attracts the boring, all-inclusive luxury travelers -- I imagine the Pacific Coast of Chiapas is the last coastal frontier of Mexico). I think the tip of Yucatan, away from Cozumel/Cancun might be neato, and also possibly under-developed and pristine -- all the development is down the coast toward Honduras -- not sure what's in the other direction, around the tip of the peninsula. Basically: drive from Cozumel to Merida. Or better yet: a bike tour across the sweltering heart of the peninsula. Hidalgo: camping and waterfalls. Heart of Mexico kinda stuff. Michoacan -- two words: butterfly sanctuary (although I think it's better in the winter when the forest is covered with a carpet of monarch butterflies, it would still be a neat, esp. with a bike). |
| caitlinkelly | Posted – 6/17/2008 11:33:40 AM | show profile DF is a wonderful city. But that's me. I've been several times, always stay at the Reina Victoria, (maybe $75/night these days) and have never felt scared or been threatened in any way. I love the food, museums, neighborhoods, parks, the 19th century bar Opera. I think missing Mexico City (aka DF) means missing a lot. Other favorites: Taxco, Acapulco, Oaxaca, Isla Mujeres, Merida, Patzcuaro (lovely small town with lots of lakes nearby). Queretaro is not wildly interesting but very pretty. I lived in Cuernavaca and also recommend it highly; only 90 minutes from DF, it's sort of the Hamptons of DF. Merida and the Yucatan have a very different culture and cuisine. Had one of the best meals of my life there at Los Almendros....that was about 20 years ago. I lived in Mexico as a blond teen -- clearly both juerita and huerita...Even then, taking all sorts of buses alone, I was never attacked or scared. Now Caracas...THAT's a really scary city. There, I dared walk barely a few blocks, even in daylight, carrying nothing, on the advice of both government and hotel staff. As chucho points out, you can have a crap experience in NYC with bored/wimpy onlookers ignoring it. It happened to me as well. |
| chucho | Posted – 6/17/2008 12:37:48 PM | show profile I agree completely with Caitlin that missing DF is missing a lot, but there's also a difference between traveler and tourist and a lot of people consider traveling as a desire to sit pampered next to a hotel pool with the sea near the place with the tequila shots (and other tourists) and the sea. I would, however, hate to send people to DF who are looking for pure adulterated R&R because DF is a loud and often overwhelming place. I lived there, too, when I was a toe-headed boy in kindergarten. The DF of the 1970s (and earlier) is completely different. http://www.fas.org/irp/imint/docs/rst/Sect4/Sect4_1.html At the bottom of this page is a couple of (really bad low rez) satellite pics of Mexico City in 1973 and 2000. I've seen higher resolution pics of these -- it clearly shows unmitigated sprawl. This is not the DF of William S. Buroughs or Aaron Copland. |
| caitlinkelly | Posted – 6/17/2008 10:41:53 PM | show profile chucho, I hear you and of course you're right. If all you want is some sanitized Mexico-Lite, best to skip DF. |
| chucho | Posted – 6/18/2008 9:02:53 AM | show profile I love drinking a nice icy cold bottle of Mexico-Lite on the beach with a key-lime wedge and totopes (nacho chips) with guac :) |
