36 Hours in Mexico City: Things to Do and See

When Mexico City was still the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan, the district of La Merced, in the southeastern edge of the Historic Center, served as a dock for goods from the mainland. There’s no water anymore, but with its thousands of informal vendors and 11 or so covered markets, La Merced still feels like a port: raucous, heady and overwhelming. To avoid getting lost, the best way to visit is over a roving breakfast with Eat Like a Local, a small tour operator that directs part of its proceeds toward educational programming for young women in the neighborhood. The company’s flagship, four-hour walk ($120 per person) covers both La Merced and the Mercado Jamaica flower market, but it can organize shorter, custom tours focused on this Mexico City landmark.

Walking from La Merced to the spectacular ceremonial plaza known as the Zócalo, stop at Cerería de Jesús for handmade beeswax candles (24 pesos) and the Ex-Teresa Arte Actual (free), a museum set in a precipitously tilting former convent. From there, traverse the sunken ruins of the Aztec Templo Mayor (100 pesos) en route to the new flagship shop for FONART, the National Fund for the Development of Crafts, and, around the corner, the moving works of José Clemente Orozco at the Colegio de San Ildefonso (50 pesos), widely considered the birthplace of Mexican muralism. Finally, take in Diego Rivera’s dynamic suite of paintings — ranging from romantic depictions of Mexican folkways to giddy gibes at capitalist excess — in the former Secretariat of Public Education, open since 2024 as the Museo Vivo del Muralismo (free).

Opened in April 2025, the restaurant Charco, on the roof of the new, kid-friendly Museo del Cacao & Chocolate, overlooks the domes and buttresses of the Metropolitan Cathedral. Charco’s kitchen, run by the Chilean chef Ricardo Verdejo, turns out an inventive, seafood-heavy menu with a strong program of cocktails, mezcals and natural wines (cocktails from 190 pesos, dinner for two about 1,500 pesos, without drinks). On a clear day — admittedly few and far between — the twin volcanic peaks of Popocatépetl and Iztaccíhuatl might appear on the horizon, but sunsets are spectacular in any weather. For a low-key drink with a bit of history, try one of the neighborhood’s classic cantinas like El Gallo de Oro (beers from 65 pesos), open since 1874 with décor that’s practically unchanged since the 1970s.

In 2022, after almost six years of collecting rare agave distillates across Mexico, the food writer Natalia de la Rosa and photographer Jason Thomas Fritz opened one of the city’s best tasting rooms, Ahuehuete, in the Historic Center. Receiving six visitors at a time, the owners pour a diverse range of high-quality spirits purchased from producers in remote villages from the highlands of Sonora to the tropical hills of Guerrero and the volcanic valleys of Michoacán. Two-hour tastings, $90, include at least six pours of mezcal that paint an incomparable picture of Mexico’s cultural and ecological diversity. For a more self-guided experience, Bósforo, also in the Centro neighborhood, remains the city’s standard-bearer for agave spirits and experimental music — still sexy and surprising more than 15 years after opening (one-ounce pours from 80 pesos).

In Mexico City, where lunches stretch well into the evening, late-night provisions, often served under fluorescent lights and a halo of smoke, make a common replacement for dinner. Options abound. Café La Pagoda, one of the Historic Center’s venerable cafés de Chinos — coffee shops opened by Chinese immigrants beginning in the 1930s — turns out enchiladas (149 pesos) and chilaquiles (94 pesos) 24 hours a day, the same punishing schedule kept at Caldos de Gallina Luis in la Roma, known for its warming bowls of chicken soup (from 65 pesos). In the Narvarte neighborhood, Tacos Tony turns out fragrant tacos de suadero (32 pesos), a block from El Vilsito, a mechanic’s shop by day and taquería by night, serving marbled petals of pastor (27 pesos) until 5 a.m.