This was our second trip to Mexico City with the kids. We love it! The kids love it! Here’s some field notes and recommendations.
Where to Stay
The Condesa neighborhood is really nice. Shady tree lined streets with palms and jacaranda trees. There’s two beautiful parks with fun playgrounds for the kids. Wonderful restaurants, bakeries, coffee shops, and boutiques. It’s walkable and safe. Given the bustle during the day, it’s surprisingly quiet in the evenings.
Airbnbs are in apartment buildings and there’s plenty of great two bedroom options in the $200-250 range. We’ve stayed within two blocks of Parque México each time.
What to Do
Children’s Musuem
The Children’s Musuem (Papalote Museo del Niño) is terrific. This is one of the places the kids asked to come back to and we could have spent the entire day here. There’s lots of guided activities the staff lead: making rockets, making slime, making new creations from recycled paper. Also plenty of just plain fun activities: giant bubbles, sandboxes, and slides.
Museo de Arte Popular
We really enjoyed this folk art museum. It had a variety of interesting objects that captivated the kids. It’s also the perfect size, great for an hour visit.
Coffee Shops and Cafes
There are so many beautiful little cafes scattered across the city. Whenever we’d head out for the day, we’d bring a backpack with notebooks, playing cards, math worksheets and books so that we could stop in a cafe and hang out for a bit. The kids enjoyed getting lemonades, smoothies or steamed milk.
Some fun spots in Condesa were Fuego & Cafe (they were really sweet with the girls and made small steamers for them “leche vapor”), El Olvidado (amazing baked goods), and Cumbe (good coffee and small bites). But there’s so many…
In the Juarez neighborhood, we enjoyed a lot of spots around Plaza Washington. Chocolatería La Rifa had great hot chocolate, our best cocktail of the trip was at Loose Blues, and El Minutito is a coffee shop and bar that would be at home in a Wes Anderson film.
Dog Watching
Our kids are obsessed with cute dogs. They were very happy to watch dogs in Parque Mexico and every evening Martine declared the “dog of the day” based on overall cuteness.
Nails?
Our girls had their nails done for the first time at Mano Santa Co in Juarez neighborhood. The staff was very sweet with them and it was quite affordable. The girls were delighted and have been picking up compliments ever since they’ve been back.
Where to Eat
Too many to list. I’ll just mention our two favorite taco spots: Tacos La Chula and Taquería Orinoco. Both have several locations throughout the city. When it doubt, go with the El Pastor.
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