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vampyresheepOur final day in Mexico! The good thing about such a long and varied holiday though is whilst we were sad to leave, we'd been here long enough for one visit - although already decided we want to return! Unfortunately little opened on Mondays so we had limited opportunity to make the most of our final day. 
I checked that the Soumaya museum was open, so after checking out and stashing out luggage, we got an Uber across town to Polanco district, dropped off outside the distinctive museum. Unfortunately I neglected to check what time it opened, so we had an hour to wait, enjoying a delicious Agua fresca and Mexican fudge on a sunny bench.
(immaculately arranged veg in the market)
Gaudi elephant in the taxi bay
and the museum itself
The museum is strikingly modern and minimalistic, from the renowned windowless mirrored obelisk appearance of it's exterior, through to it's sweepingly empty ramps inside, a stark contrast to the collection of European baroque, religious and 20th art. We were mainly there to see the building and it's later than expected opening threw my plans a bit, so we dashed around, checking out the highlights and avoiding the snooty staff. Bizarrely this place had the highest security of anything else we'd visited in Mexico!
the antique ivory gallery prompted mixed feelings - on one hand, incredibly wrong (but context, these were centuries old) but on the other, incredible works of art
sweeping, stark ramps took you gradually up to each floor of the gallery
until you reach the sculpture gallery at the top - which was rather bizarre, a room full of little sculptures standing austerely on white plinths, in the stark white room
this one was quite beautiful - not by Erte, as I originally assumed but must be an artist in the same field as him, the style so similar
a lot of French art here, like this Toulouse-Lautrec piece
the gift shop
Diego Rivera designed mosaics in the entrance lobby
Rob wanted to do some final shop browsing instead of culture, so our next stop was the artesan market La Ciudadela. It was a lot bigger than we expected but not very busy, with a laid back, friendly atmosphere, so we spent an enjoyable couple of hours here making some final shopping purchases (having already decided we were going to check our cases in for the return flight, leaving us with the option of four bags of hand luggage!)
I had originally intended to finish our holiday with a good meal, wanting to try out the much hyped Contramar, seafood restaurant, but we didn't want to rush our time here and there was a little, colourful and appealing cafe in the centre. 
Good call! It was a lovely place, exactly the traditional Mexican feel we wanted for our last dining experience. Busy but friendly staff, a vibrant atmosphere, so much colour everywhere and most importantly, good value and tasty home cooked food.
Rob had scrambled egg and ham, and I finally got to have tortilla soup. Which I loved! A spicy tomato soup, with a side dish of avocado, tortillas, sour cream and cheese, too add to taste (aka, tip the lot in the bowl of soup!)
We then had a plate of various flavour quesadillas to share, and our meal was accompanied by the biggest grails of fruit juice ever! Seriously, I needed two hands to pick it up!
Revisited a couple of stalls to make final purchases now we knew how much cash we had left to use up, then got an Uber back to our accommodation. Gathered our pesos for an ice cream and sat in the park for our last hour, before collecting luggage and heading to the airport.
No problem checking in for our journey home and I'd had the foresight to book a slightly better seat, on the upper deck, for our flight to Paris. This was good and bad.
The good - a seat just for two people and because it was the front row of standard/cattle class, there was a divider instead of a seat in front of us - all the legroom!
The bad/mild inconvenience - no proper telly screen, we had pull out screens in our armrests, which had to be packed away for take off and landing. No bags allowed between our feet! I had my fragile grim reaper statue wrapped up and carried in it's own bag, it would get crushed if it went in the overhead locker! Thankfully the 1st Class Attendant came to my rescue when our attendant was getting a bit snippy with me, and she found me an empty locker, padding it out with blankets for extra protection.
The food on AirFrance was so much nicer than our outbound meals on Aeromexico, enjoyable even, and so filling! Watched a couple of films, Ant-Man & the Wasp, followed by a fun Japanese super hero film, then nearly slept for a few hours until we were served breakfast.
Arriving in Paris, we had a 5 hour wait for our connecting flight. There was a free lounge, which was stylish, quiet and comfortable but I thought it would be nice to kill some time with a nice meal and was assured by the Information person that there were lots of restaurants and bars at our terminal. Only after going through security and into the departure lounge did we realise that “lots of” apparently meant a Starbucks and a half stocked Pret-a-manger! Somehow the time did pass quickly in this hell hole, and we were finally on our last leg home with only the prospect of how we'll carry 6 bags of luggage home with us!
It was a fantastic trip, the only slight regret was maybe should have stayed in Cholula instead of Puebla but we picked a range of places to stay, not knowing what to expect. We definitely plan to return, hopefully in 2020, the dilemma will be where - return to Oaxaca or discover places new in this massive, diverse and amazing country.
The gallery for this final day is hereand all the photo galleries for each day of the holiday can be accessed via this link
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Date: 11 Dec 2018 08:19 (UTC)no subject
Date: 11 Dec 2018 09:01 (UTC)