It’s best to read about my trip in order so you don’t miss part of the “story”. If you haven’t read the previous posts, go to the sidebar on the right and in the archive section, start at Day 1 in April of 2011.

Day 2 we come to find that there is still no luggage. Now we’re (really they’re) starting to worry. Not only does it have the gifts for family in them, but one of the suitcases has my tripod in it (for the wedding) and another has – are you ready for this – the wedding dress and all the bride’s clothes andone has the groom’s suit and all his clothes! There’s a little stress at this point. We’ve alsodiscovered that we have absolutely no cell service (and we’ve got three different carriers between us), and our host & hostess’ internet connection isn’t working.

Our hostess was able to lend us a cell phone that they weren’t using – one to carry around Mexico with us. This was also used to call the airlines a couple times a day.

Breakfast is the first order of the day! Our only requestto our host was that we wanted to go to local places. We walked around the corner to a cute place called RestauranteCon-TrastasPlus. It’s located at Leibnitz #11-D, Col. Anzures, Del. Miguel Hidalgo, C.P. 11590, Cd. de Mxico, Distrito Federal. Telephone # 4623-3902. Now, It was our first day, and I couldn’t stomach the fact of a typical breakfast which consists of things such as taco’s, etc. I ordered hot cakes (Pancakes – like how I picked up on the language?). My mom got huveos (eggs). My brother and his wife ended up gettingtrue Mexican breakfasts and boy did they look good!

p.s. it’s 40 pesos and 43 pesos, not $40 and $43 as I originally thought. $1 US dollar converts to 11.74 pesos.

The pastries and the bread is what they immediately put down before we even ordered our drinks! One thing you’ll want to know -see the wonderful pastries on the table? They charge extra for those. We didn’t eat them.

chilaquiles w/chicken

You’ll have to excuse the awful photography when it comes to the food pictures..

Sincronizada(flour tortilla with cheese and ham)

This is the outside of the building. No real name to jump out at you.

After breakfast we then walked back to the condo to meet up with our tour guide. One of my sister-in-law’s sisters hired an old co-worker of hers to drive us around for the day in our rental car. She paid him 300 pesos.

Pictures taken on our walk back:

Many people used this style broom, although he also had a broom like we’re used to.

We first askedour guideto take us to Wal-Mart so that we could buy some bottled water and sunscreen. No one ever drinks the tap water in Mexico – not even the residents. It’s hard toimagine all the empty water bottles that they must have – hopefully getting recycled. You see men riding around on bicycles, with a little wagon attached to them, carrying the huge bottles of water that you see here in the statesfor water coolers. Restaurants get bagged ice delivered to them. I don’t believe they have carbonated soda. I could be wrong. But everywhere we went, they had Coca-Cola in bottles. When I say restaurants, I mean thenice one’s. There may besome places out there who might try to serve tap. Just make sure it’s in a bottle and the bottle is sealed.

Here are a couple shotsI took from Wal-Mart. We get there and have to take a ticket from a machine, as you would when you park in a parking garage that you have to pay for. Yes, you have to pay for parking! It was 3 cents for an hour. Can’t remember if it is our cents or theirs. Parking is at a premium there because of the space, and I’ve got another shot that will show this on my post for Day 4 of my trip. The Wal-Mart parking lot is exactly as it looks. I didn’t miss anything. To the left part of the picture, out of sight, is another building.

These are cactus leaves. My sister-in-law’s father actually has it every day in a drink for his high cholesterol. I guess it’s really good for you.

Our major site seeing tour of the day are the Teotihuacan Pyramids. These are the most visited archeological sites in Mexico. The Pyramid of the Sun is the 3rd largest pyramid in the wholeworld. You can read more about them by clicking the link. I glanced throughthe info on the linkand am pretty happywith the well detailed content. A few things to know:1) There are a lot ofvendors walking around trying to sell their wares. The most famous saying between them all is “One dollar. Almost free.”2) There are no toilet seats or toilet paper – at least in the two bathrooms that I “visited” and onewas the men’s – hey, I am not about to stand in a long line of school kids when I have to go! Their women’ssanitarios(bathrooms – really means health)have lines just like the women’s restrooms in the states. The men’s are always free to use! 3)You walk a lot and the stairs are a lot steeper than they seem. I did not climb to the top of any of them. I get heat exhaustion very easily and I didn’t want to ask for trouble. My brother did go up to the top of the Pyramid of the Sun.

This is the only place we went to that was outside of Mexico City and it’s neighborhoods. Not because it wasn’t safe, just because we had soooo many other things to see in Mexico City. Amazing aren’t they?!

Here are a few more shots ofus tourists and from across the street from the pyramids:

Just in caseyou don’t realize, this is pointing to the city ofMxico, not the country.

What’s next? Lunch! We drove back to Mexico City and had lunch at ParillaLeonesa. I’ll try to get the address at a later date.

Here’s a picture taken from the car while sittingat a traffic light:

Yum! We made it to the restaurante. We all split several plates of tacos. The food was very good and reasonable as we found at most places. Again, what did I say? Forgive the food photos! I was hungry and everyone else wanted to dig in:

The drink in the upper left isagua de orchata (rise water)

Alambre

Afterwards, we walked around downtown Mexico and took some pictures of the architecture which is amazing and some people:

Banco of Mxico

Museodel Palaciode BellasArtes – they hold concerts and exhibits here.

Museodel Palaciode BellasArtes

Oficinade correos (Post Office)

On our drive home, I took these shots out the car window – again – at stop lights. So many pictures to take! So little time!

We got back to the condo and stayed in the rest of the night. I had to get ready for the wedding the next day, and the bride had to go stay the night at her brother’s apartment. That’s where her parents were staying while in town for the wedding. They actually live four hours from Mexico City. Just for a little more info, the bride has nine brother’s and sister’s. All were able to make the wedding except for one brother that lives in Washington (the state of). Her family are the NICEST people!

Are you curious about the luggage? Earlier in the daywefound out that two of the suitcases were found. When we got back, we discovered that they were the one’swith my brother’s clothes with his suite. Still no tripod or dress. Still missing two suitcases. My sister-in-law is going to borrow a friend’s dress who just got married. Up until this point, she’s also been borrowing her sister’s clothes since she has none.

For dinner I had the fantastic looking pastries that you saw on the table in the Day 1 post. I had 1/2 of every one and my mom basically had the other halves. We let my brother have a bite or two.

See you at the wedding tomorrow!