It was a very productive day for Bricole, everyone’s favorite celebrity couple. Our boutique hotel didn’t have much offerings for breakfast, but the neighborhood also has quite a few bakeries so this was not a problem. Then I suggested we try again to deal with Nicole’s stomach woes. Yesterday evening, I discovered that while the United States forbids any generics from entering the market for Nicole’s antibiotic, this is not true for Mexico. It is sold under a different name and about $2900 cheaper. The pharmacist found it immediately, then suggested we go next door to the lab to get a bacteria analysis. This was all done in about 15 minutes from start to finish. USA! USA!
A little before noon, we began our adventures into el bosque de Chapultepec. It could be compared to New York’s Central Park. It is a massive area with numerous museums, food stalls, and other attractions. It was about a 35 minute walk from our hotel to our first stop at the Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo. Bricole always enjoy a good modern art museum. This one was a bit small, but had its own charms — particularly a very dark room with a few dimly lit sculptures and a Rothko off by itself. In another room, Nicole got a kick out a black and white video of a man doing some sort of weird stomping and balancing. Art.
Our next stop was the Museo Nacional de Antropología. It is a massive museum and Mexico’s most popular. I watched a movie on the flight here called Museo, which starred Gael García Bernau, and was about a heist that took place at the museum in 1985. I therefore made it my mission to find some of the pieces that were stolen (and obviously returned later on). One of these was a jade mask of Pakal, a Mayan king, found in a tomb in Palenque. It took some hunting to find in the museum, but we eventually found it.
The museum was quite a maze as well. Despite moving fairly swiftly through many of the exhibits, we were exhausted from the walking that the museum required. We had to stop and sit for a spell to recover our strength to carry on. We had one more stop to hit up before returning to La Condesa.
Next we scaled the hill up to the Castillo de Chapultepec. This ornate building on the hill served as many things — summer palace, military academy, and was eventually attacked by the United States — an event immortalized with the line, “From the Halls of Montezuma…” in the Marine Corps hymn. And now Chapultepec castle is a museum and gardens. It offered nice views of some of the high rises and boulevards of the city — albeit through a layer of haze/pollution.
Nicole enjoyed the black and white tiles that encircled the property. It was quite hot being outside in the sun despite being just 75 degrees. It is a lot like Los Angeles in that regard — that sun can be intense. There were a few interior areas of the castle that we could see as well including a nice looking hallway with some stained glass windows.
After our substantial amount of walking through el bosque de Chapultepec, we walked back to La Condesa to regroup and relax. We stopped briefly in a bookstore/cafe and then sat up on our fourth floor terrace of our hotel to relax with such cliche items like a coke with real sugar. We made a stop back at the lab from this morning to get Nicole’s test results. She doesn’t have H. Pylori everyone! — she just has a bad stomach.
Then Nicole let me peruse the streets for a good torta. With a discerning glare from her direction, I knew which torta stands were not ok. Eventually we walked to Roma Norte, the adjacent neighborhood and I was allowed to get a torta at a sort of low-brow sit down kind of place. The reviews were from a lot of people saying things like, “Been coming here since I was a kid — best tortas in the whole city!” Anyway, I thought mine was kind of . . .meh, but Nicole thought maybe it was like eating Italian food in Italy which can be inferior to the “real deal” at establishments like the Olive Garden. I kid! I kid! I chased it down with a pastel de chocolate, which was actually quite good.
We got Nicole a pizza to go from Felix pizzeria and picked up a few drinks and pastries for our early departure tomorrow morning before settling back in to our room. Nicole consumed her pizza and then battled with Hilton in an attempt to get a room in Nicaragua. There were plenty of rooms available, but there was a lot of confusion as to how to book them as the Hilton site itself didn’t show them. So that’s a whole thing. We discussed our plans for tomorrow at the Casa Mali’s bar over a couple cervezas before signing out for the night.
passports & pepto bismol 