Mexico City

Here we are in one of the highest capital cities in the world at 2.5 kilometres above sea level with a population of 22 million. We are in the heart of the city in the "Zocola" - conquistador central, staying in one of the best establishments The Gran Hotel Ciudad De Mexico - have a look at this.

Had an easy catch-up day yesterday recovering from our travels by just taking in the cathedral area.

Today we went flat out exploring the whole central area, taking in the local shopping precincts, an Aztec archaeological site and its museum, booked an all day tour for tomorrow and organised our travel to Cuba.

After taking a break for a drink at our hotel we next set off  into the tourist precinct for our evening meal. This part of Mexico City is nothing like the cosmopolitan Peru we loved - no casinos, few ATMs, everything is shut by 10pm - and trying to find a restaurant (worse still one that serves wine) is hard. There are McDs, Piza Hut, Burger King, Kentucky Fried, and this Mexican cafe chain that serves identical food in each city block.

After a long search we found the Opera Bar Restaurant - and even though the Entrée snails that were so small I had to use a toothpick to dig them out of the shell we had a very good meal in a pretty swank place!