😎 Back in Mexico

After two months away, we have book updates, new restaurants and bars, protests, government crackdowns, and more!

We're back in Mexico City after two months in Pennsylvania catching up with friends and family, revisiting favorite restaurants and places, and going to appointments and the other things that we have to do there. And now we're here again. And we have a lot to do. So here's an update on what's happened, what we're planning for this trip, and what happens after.

🏢 Our first renter

Before we left Mexico in early May, Stephanie saw that a woman in a Facebook group she's part of was searching for a place to stay in Mexico City for one or two months. She reached out to this person, and they had a few conversations. The result being that she stayed in our apartment for most of the time we were gone. People have stayed here without us before. But this was the first time someone paid to rent our apartment.

That mostly worked out. We had to pack all our personal belongings into bins and store them in our storage closet on the roof of the building, so that was a hassle on either side of this stay. And whenever someone is in your place, there's going to be some minor breakage or other issues.

But those are the types of things one deals with in this situation. Our apartment isn't listed on any vacation rental services and won't be. But Stephanie, especially, is open to this sort of thing if it makes sense.

✈️ A few flight firsts

We moved from the Boston area to Pennsylvania in 2017, which changed how we fly. We have a choice of three major airports now—Newark, Philadelphia, and, if there's no other way, JFK—but each is at least 90 minutes away with traffic, which is a hassle. We've mostly settled on Newark, and we switched our primary airline to United because it offers so many non-stop flights to so many places. And now we have some low level of status and use a United credit card for points we can use towards travel. Long story short, we have flown on United from Newark to Mexico City every time we've come here. And we've come here a lot in the past four years.

But then Aeroméxico opened up some new routes between the U.S. and Mexico last year, one of them a non-stop between Philadelphia and Mexico City. This was very interesting to us because we've flown on Aeroméxico inside Mexico, and it was a great experience. And at least for now, the prices are very low. And so for this trip, for the first time, we've flown internationally out of Philly on Aeroméxico. The prices were low enough that we were able to get business class upgrades, which really makes a difference. And it was predictably a great experience.

This raises questions about future trips. But for now, at least, we'll see what happens. If the Aeroméxico flights continue to be less expensive, we might be making a permanent change. Or not...

🛬 Terminal 2, oh my

Flying from Newark on United to Mexico City, we've always landed at Terminal 1 at Aeropuerto Internacional Benito Juárez (which we think of as the Mexico City airport). But our Aeroméxico flight landed at Terminal 2. And that can be problematic.

With one exception, we have never waited in a line at customs in Terminal 1, and that one time we did wait, the line was short and we were delayed less than 10 minutes. We've only flown into Terminal 2 twice now, and our recent flight here was the first time we've done so internationally. So I can't say whether our experience in customs was unusual or the norm. All I can tell you is that the customs experience in Terminal 2 that day was terrible. It's in the middle of a remodeling or whatever, and so many of the signs are pointing to the wrong places. And while the Mexican side of this room was basically empty, the side for international travelers was jam-packed with a sea of humanity. Great.

We waited in the international line for about 20 minutes, though I kept looking at the signs and thinking that our residency cards would let us use the Mexican side of the room where, again, there was no line. After snaking our way through a few turns of the queue, I finally asked someone. And sure enough, our Mexico residency cards allowed us to skip the long international line in customs, something we'd never had to even think about flying into Terminal 1. There was some confusion around whether we should use the automated kiosks or speak to an agent, but there was no line anyway, and we did the latter without any issues.

📦 What we brought

This may or may not be obvious, but one of the benefits to owning a place in another location is that you can leave your stuff there. This lightens the load considerably while traveling, or at least it can, since we tend to cart whatever items we need back and forth on most trips. But we have almost all the clothes we require here in Mexico City, and we have pretty complete computer setups for working, and we travel even more lightly than usual for the most part.

I write about technology in my day job, so I often bring review laptops or other electronics back and forth to Mexico, plus various electronics. But I also brought a few things to leave here, including a USB-C display I can use as a second display while working here, a mini tripod for phones, some Ethernet cables, and a few smaller items. And since we got back, I ordered two electronics-related items from Amazon: a stand for the portable display and a third Eeero Wi-Fi router, both of which were curiously reasonably priced (electronics are generally pricier in Mexico). On a future trip, I'll bring a NAS (network attached storage) device that I will hard-wire to the new NAS and put both in the laundry room.

📰 In the news

Mexico and Mexico City are regularly in the news in the United States—much of our country seems obsessed with all the bad things they think are happening here—but they've been in the news for a different reason lately: The so-called gringo protests in which the locals in Mexico City decry the gentrification that is raising housing prices and forcing them out of certain neighborhoods.

This is a big, nuanced topic, so we will be writing about that separately soon. But if you follow us here or on our YouTube channel, you hopefully know that we have always approached this place with respect for the people, the place, the culture, and the history, and we're both actively trying to learn Spanish. In short, our goal in Mexico is not to get this place to be more like us, but rather for us to change to be more like this place.

But we don't see the protests as the big story here this year. Right after we left in early May, the new Mexico City government did what new governments always do and started an initiative that was uniquely theirs, a way by which it could leave its mark. And this particular initiative, called La Noche es de Todas y Todos ("the night belongs to everyone"), is supposedly targeting corruption by cracking down on establishments--mostly bars, restaurants, and nightclubs--all over Mexico City.

The crime? Code violations, real or imagined, and in the latter case, codes that haven't been changed in 40 years. This is impacting hundreds of businesses all over the city, including many in the area of Condesa and Roma Norte, several of which that are among our favorite local places, and in our book. As I write this, Bolero Cafe, La Morenita, and La Oliva are among the many places within a few minutes of our apartment that are shut down. We normally visit each repeatedly throughout any given week.

This is not right. But like the protests noted above, it's a big, nuanced story that deserves more attention. So we'll be writing about that soon as well.

🫂 Reunions with friends

In sharp contrast to the gringo protest stories you've almost certainly seen, our experience on the ground here in Roma Norte has been very different over the past week. We have many friends and acquaintances here now, and each time we return, we have a series of mini-reunions with them, usually over the first few days as we make the rounds and see what's changed. There's been a lot of hugging, big smiles, and excited people on both sides eager to catch up with each other.

We love it here. And the wonderful people here play an outsized role in that.

🍽️ Places new and familiar

Mexico City is the biggest city in North America by far, and it has a vibrant food scene that would surprise most people, I think. Despite knowing this, we are surprised by how many new bars and restaurants there are in our area each time we return. Early on, we had documented over 20 bars and restaurants we love within a 10-minute walk of our apartment. But that list has since grown dramatically, and it grows each time we come back. This is a unique kind of problem, but particularly so for us because of the book and our desire to give others good advice.

This always fascinates us. We walk in whatever direction on whatever streets, and there are always new places. But there are also some interesting new trends. For example, between November 2024 and early 2025, dozens of new cocktail bars opened in Condesa and Roma Norte alone, and there were likely many more throughout the city.

These are mostly high-end, craft cocktail bars with inventive menus, but what's most appealing to us is that they're also what we think of as traditional cocktail bars and not what had been the norm in Mexico City up until now. That is, they have bars you can actually sit at. In our book, we explain that this common practice in the U.S. and Europe is highly unusual in Mexico City, at least. But that's changing.

This makes sense to us. Mexicans are friendly and social, and it always seemed to us that, generally speaking, they would love bars. And for whatever reasons—yes, gentrification played a role, we're sure—it's happening now.

As we update the book, we think about the places we want to include, and we ensure that we've visited each multiple times. Unlike many of the creators we see on YouTube or whatever platform, we will never visit a place once and then publish something like "Everything you need to know" about that place. And so there are places we've been to only once that we have to visit again to see whether they warrant inclusion in the book. And there are all the new places that open on each visit.

On this trip, it occurred to us that we can at least cover some of these less familiar places in a way that makes sense. And so we will start creating short write-ups of places that are new to us so you can learn about them as we do. And if they warrant it, we will visit again. And maybe repeatedly. The best ones will get a more formal write-up in the book.

Saturday, we did something that is unusual for us. We had lunch and dinner at places that were new to us. This wasn't a plan. We had talked about getting tamales on Saturday morning at Tamales Doña Emi, our favorite. But we woke up later than usual, and they run out of options by late morning on weekends. And so we decided to walk over to Madre Café and see whether they had have walk-in availability, as they have a notably good brunch. Predictably, this was a bad idea: Madre Café is crazy-popular, and there was a line on the sidewalk outside. So we improvised and walked up to Avenida Álvaro Obregón, the broad street that bisects Roma Norte.

There, we found two new places that had each opened recently. And they were right next to each other. We had brunch at Ajeno, which was delightful, and especially so because a friend of ours who used to work at a different local restaurant was there, so we could catch up with him as well.

And just before we found Ajeno, we were approached by a man coming out of another new restaurant called AlmaMía. They were not open yet at the time, but we looked at the menu, thought it looked interesting, and told him we'd come back. Sure enough, we had dinner there that night. It, too, was fantastic, a high-end dining experience on the level of Máximo and Rosetta.

We will write up short overviews of our experiences at Ajeno and AlmaMía soon.

Oh, and we did get tamales this morning. Fantastic!

⛈️ Once upon a time, in July...

What we think of as summer in the U.S. is the rainy season in Mexico City. This can be misunderstood: When our kids first visited here in August 2021, we almost postponed the trip because of sensational stories about the rainy season and how it could ruin a trip. But we proceeded with the trip, everyone had a great time, and we've spent several months here now during the annual rainy season.

Here's the truth: For the most part, the rainy season is a good thing. Rain clears the air of pollution, which is always welcome. And it's usually not too bad. The clouds gather in the afternoon on many days, and it rains for a bit, sometimes heavily. It's manageable.

But it also varies year-to-year. And this year, the rainy season started earlier than usual, and Mexico City has experienced numerous days in a row of heavy rain that lasts much longer than usual. It's been quite rainy since we arrived, though mostly from late afternoon into the night. It hasn't disrupted any of our plans yet.

Tied to this, we experienced something bizarre in July 2023, when we were woken a bit after 5 a.m. by what sounded like an invading army. We stumbled out onto the deck, bleary-eyed, and saw this.

Naturally, we asked everyone we knew what it was. And almost to a one, no one had any idea. Most who live in this area didn't hear or see anything if they were a few blocks away or more. So the mystery endured.

Later that year, new neighbors moved in across from us and our building, and they quickly became good friends. I told them the story about the 5 a.m. parade in the dark and showed them the video. And then the following July came, and we got a text message: We were back in Pennsylvania, but our friends in the apartment in Mexico City had been woken up by the same parade! So it wasn't a one-off event.

Well, we're back again. It's July. And I'm embarrassed to say I forgot all about this bizarre parade. But over our second night here this past week, on July 9—which I now know to be the same day we were woken up by that parade two years ago—it happened again! This time, I was able to rush out onto the balcony early enough to record more of it. And share a funny moment with our neighbor, who stumbled out onto his own balcony, having been woken up by this yet again.

The theory is that these are police cadets, most likely celebrating a graduation. But why it's at 5:00 a.m. in the dark remains a mystery.

📖 Plans for this trip

We updated our book, Eternal Spring: Our Guide to Mexico City, less than expected over the past two months, mostly just minor updates. That said, you should download the latest version of the book if you own it: We fix typos and other errors and add content, and there have been some changes since we were last here in May.

We are more aggressively updating the book while we're here. We have long lists of content we want to add that span restaurant and bar reviews, overviews of sights, and all the reference material for the back of the book. And we would like to finally come through on a promise we've been making for a long time now and make more videos as well. Video is tedious and time-consuming to produce. But we also think it's necessary in the sense that different people prefer different types of content.

So stay tuned. We've been working all weekend on the book, and we will keep at it while we're here. Which is my final topic for today ...

🗓️ This trip, future trips

Stephanie and I have discussed a future in which we would split our time between a place in the United States and a place in some international destination almost from the day we got married. In our early years together, Europe seemed like the obvious choice, and we spent decades visiting France, Spain, Ireland, The Netherlands, and elsewhere on that continent together and with our kids and friends. We also never really had a plan. And so when the pandemic happened and we found ourselves in Mexico City the following year, everything changed. And suddenly, we realized that dream. In Mexico, not Europe.

That's wonderful, of course, but it also introduces problems. We have friends and family in Pennsylvania and elsewhere in the United States, places we like to visit, and things we like to do there. And now we have Mexico. Deciding where to be, and when, is perhaps more challenging than is obvious. We have children at different stages of early adulthood who we don't want to feel abandoned. We had a dog and two cats until pretty recently, and that added another complexity and cost. On and on it goes.

Our goal over the past few years has been to spend more time in Mexico. This year, we will, for the first time, spend more time in Mexico than we spend in the United States. But where and when is still challenging. An even six-month split is too long, so it doesn't make sense. We were here for almost four months earlier this year. We booked this trip for about a month and a half. And then we have plans to spend all of October and most of November in Mexico, too.

Right after we booked this trip, however, our daughter called with exciting news: She took the final class she needed to graduate this summer instead of waiting, and she passed. Which means she will graduate from college in North Carolina in early August and not in December as we had expected. We're happy for her, obviously, but early August is right in the middle of our current stay in Mexico. So we had a decision to make.

We could fly to Charlotte, North Carolina for the graduation and then come back to Mexico, staying here until the end of August as planned. Or, we could just change our return flight from here to early August, go back to Pennsylvania, and then go to the graduation from there.

As I write this, we haven't yet booked anything, but that will happen soon. The most likely outcome is that we fly back early, and so this trip will be about a month long instead of a month and a half. That's fine: We still plan to come back for October and most of November, and we will still spend more than half of 2025 in Mexico. I have a big work trip in September, and we both have more appointments. And then the holiday season is when we want to be in the U.S., because we spend Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year Eve with family and friends.

After that, it will be 2026, and we'll be back in Mexico. For how long? We're not sure yet, but it should be a lot like what we did here. We are perhaps transitioning into a schedule that makes sense for us.

More soon!