The first day to see Mexico City

The first stop of the bus was at the Plaza de las tres culturas. It was a church that had ruins beside it and a new part of the church added onto the back side of the church. The second stop of the day was to the Basilica. It is a church deemed holy by the pope in Rome. It was originally built because the Virgin Mary, known here as the Lady of Guadalupe, told one of the conquistadors to build a sanctuary. There was a lot of religious history and there were three buildings. The oldest and first was built on the hill and the second larger structure was built down the hill. They had to build a third building because the second building was on uneven ground because of a fault line. The majority of the people in Mexico are Catholic so there was lots of church history and many people in the Basilica to pay respect or pray. The bus then took us to Teotihuacan to see the pyramids and ruins there. It was amazing...truly breathtaking. Our tour guide´s name was Ricardo. He knew so much about the temples and pyramids. Everything the Aztec´s built had a purpose and was built to perfection. The angles of the steps were made at 92 degrees so that it would make great accustic sound that if at the right angle sounded like the song of a bird when you clapped. The history and culture or the Aztec people was fantastic. We climbed three pyramids all day. The tallest, the sun pyramid, was 245 step up and 245 steps back down. I was very tired but the view was phenominal. I´ve never seen anything like it or experienced such history with a landmark. We went under some of the ruins and Ricardo, our tour guide, told us the story of how the Aztec´s believed the sun and moon were created. It was a story passed generation to generation that was really interesting. He turned the lights off in the cave and started a little fire so it felt very real and I felt like I was experiencing the history. The Aztec´s believed in Harmony with the Earth and the animals. The people selling souvineers they had made were very very pushy, but it was all part of the experience. The Aztec´s believe that something big will happen on December 23, 2012 at 12:23 am when their calendar ends. We had a late lunch at the family of the tour guide´s house. They prepared and served us a 5 course meal. We started with sopa de frijoles (a bean soup), then we ate tortas, then rice and chilis poblanos, then chicken, and for dessert ate cactus pear and cantalope. It was all very delicious and although I had worked up an appitite, I did get very full. We headed back to the hotel after talking for a while. Me and Kara stayed in the room for the night to relax from a very long day.