The best vacation destination is closer than you think. This spring, head south to the greatest country in America.
No country in the world (not even Kazakhstan) is more misunderstood than the land across the Rio Grande. (We don't even blame Trump.) For whatever reason, gringos always seem to visit only the absolute worst places: all-inclusive tourist hellscapes where you need a wristband to order a watery margarita and the quesadillas come with a side of ketchup. But Mexico has quietly become a world-class travel destination, without sacrificing its character and history—its soul. Why should we fly across an ocean when, right across our border, cities are booming with Europe-level restaurants and parks are packed with Australia-level adventure? It's insane to think that while we've been backpacking through Thailand and foodie-pilgrimaging to Copenhagen, Mexico has been right there all along, getting better (more stable, more progressive, more sophisticated) all the time.
In the past few years, the country's interior has become as compelling as its shoreline. The art scene now rivals anything in the hemisphere. Even though it's close enough for a quick getaway and familiar enough to require zero acclimation, parts of its landscape feel like a different planet. Extravagance abounds if that's your thing, but the country's cheap thrills (e.g., carnitas) offer at least as much primal pleasure. This is, after all, the culture that gave the world chocolate, guacamole, mezcal, and Salma Hayek. It knows how to have a good time.
In these pages, you'll find dozens of other reasons to go right now. So join us as we get re-acquainted with our southern neighbor. Because with every passing day in America, Mexico seems less like the cause of all our problems and more like the solution.
...For the Totally Surreal Wilderness
Chiapas will remind you of your best days outside in Colorado—minus the legal edibles. Much of the state is nature preserves. And most of the action is within driving distance of the charming town of San Cristóbal de las Casas, the perfect place to wind down with the local ceremonial drink, pox, which is to Chiapas what bourbon is to Kentucky.
DAY 1
Trip Out Underground
Head to Sima de las Cotorras just before sunrise, when the thousands of green parakeets that live in this sinkhole—about 500 feet across and deep—rise in spiraling flocks in search of food. Rappel to the bottom and gawk at wall paintings believed to be up to 10,000 years old. Chiapas is littered with other dramatic caves, including El Chorreadero, which you enter like something out of Tomb Raider, descending into a vast network of caverns with underground springs.
DAY 2
Roll Up to the Pyramids
To get a feel for the bonkers topography of Chiapas, where pines battle palms for real estate, sign up for Jaguar Adventours' bike excursion to the Río Totolapa—it starts on a mountaintop and ends at a waterfall. Or, if you're more into hiking, visit the Mayan site of Toniná, the tallest pyramid in Mexico, at almost 250 feet. All the structures (and their 360-degree views) can be explored without a guide; in the States you'd have to sign some kind of death waiver.
DAY 3
Ride a Waterfall
Chiapas may have the most aquatic diversity in Mexico, with countless freshwater bodies and 180 miles of secluded ocean beach. So kayak your way through Lagunas de Montebello, a network of 59 lakes, each a unique and vivid color due to its mineral content. Or raft Agua Azul, a series of stepped waterfalls with up to 50-foot drops. Or (if you're not insane) plunge into Cenote Chucumaltik, a crystalline lake (a sinkhole, really), and dive above petrified trees, a quartz deposit, and an altar to the Virgin Mary.
...For Holbox Island, the Better Cancún
A short, spray-in-your-face boat ride off the Yucatán coast, Holbox is on a cigar-shaped spit so narrow you can practically heave a coconut from shore to shore. With golf carts for taxis and sand for pavement, it is literally where the streets have no name. All you do is sunbathe and swim, taking daily lunch breaks to eat the life-changing ceviche at a mom-and-pop stand called La Chingada. At night you swim again, only this time the water is bioluminescent; turquoise sparks fly off your fingertips as you wave them through the water and realize that you don't miss civilization even one little bit.
...For Mexico City’s Magnificent Transformation
As the city becomes a mecca of art and food, new neighborhoods keep popping up as symbols of the revolution: first Condesa, then Roma, and now Colonia Juárez, a district of rehabbed mansions. Here, author Jorge Pedro Uribe (the Anthony Bourdain of Mexico City) maps the highlights.
Bar Milán and Parker & Lenox “Parker & Lenox is a great speakeasy for jazz, swing, and other sounds of the '30s and '40s; Bar Milán is a classic that I hope can survive.”
Amaya The hottest restaurant opening of 2016, bar none.
Barbería Capital Because every hood needs a hipster barbershop.
Expendio Records The spot for underground vinyl and rowdy parties.
Panadería Rosetta “Havre is kind of the ‘gentrifier’ street, and Rosetta bakery is the best place to hike your sugar—and pleasure—levels.”
Café Gaby's “It might be the only old-school coffee shop like this in the neighborhood. I love the collection of old coffee mills and molinillos, which are hot-chocolate beaters.”
Marso Gallery Housed in an ornate old mansion, it's one of a handful of contemporary-art galleries to open in the area.
Corner of Berlín & Versalles “It's one of the prettiest and most historic parts of the neighborhood.”
...For a Peaceful Villa (With No Mega-Resort in Sight)__
You can have pretty much the same experience in an Acapulco resort that you can in Jamaica. So find a place that harmonizes with its surroundings instead of overshadowing them. A half-hour car ride up the coast from Tulum, Hotel Esencia was built as a retreat for an Italian duchess. Its manicured grounds, including a semi-private beach, are wedged between the gnarly jungle and the sparkling sea. And all lodgings are either suites or villas. In short, Esencia is as far removed from an Acapulco high-rise as it gets.
Hey, Enrique Olvera, you're the super-chef behind restaurants Pujol in Mexico City and Moxi in San Miguel de Allende. Where should we be eating next?
“One of the pioneer cooks in Baja is Jair Téllez, who opened Laja in 2001. It's got great natural wines and homemade bread. I also like the avant-garde techniques at Néctar in Mérida. And there's Restaurante Alcade in Guadalajara, which does Mexican flavor at its best.”
…For the Freaky Solitude
What you see in the picture all the way at the top of the page is not some new glamping situation in Marfa. It's not Mars 100 years after Elon Musk plants his flag. It's Mexico. Encuentro Guadalupe, to be exact—a design hotel that's easily the strangest, most exhilarating base for exploring Baja's burgeoning wine country. Each of the 20 “eco-lofts” (starting at $275) is a freestanding pod, reachable only by shuttle and/or hiking trail. There's no TV, no ice machine. Just you, a view, and the realization that you're doing Mexico the right way. For more on that, keep reading.
...For Outdoor Nirvana in One Epic Ride
Mexico's most famous passenger train—nicknamed El Chepe—makes the 400-mile trek from the parched dunes of Chihuahua through the Sierra Madre and into the sugarcane fields of Los Mochis in about 16 hours. Here's what you'll see along the way.
1. Westworld IRL
After trundling across a cowboy landscape that Pancho Villa once roamed, you reach the town of Creel and a 4,134-foot tunnel—only the second-longest of 87 you'll encounter.
2. Just-as-Grand Canyon
Divisadero is where Copper Canyon cleaves, revealing its awesome emptiness, so hop off and 'gram it. Bonus: Vendors huddle by the track, heating blue-corn tortillas over smoky fires.
3. Quick Break
In Cerocahui, a remote farming village of about 1,500 people, spend a night at San Isidro Lodge, an eco-retreat that features an electricity-less meditation cabin.
4. Quick Workout
Six thousand feet below the canyon's lip in Urique, the 50-mile Caballo Blanco Ultramarathon, memorialized in the best-seller Born to Run, draws hundreds of locos every spring.
5. Vertigo!
As the mountains spill into rivers, you cross Río Chinipas on a spine-tingling bridge 335 feet above the water.
6. Big Reward
Down by the Sea of Cortez, you'll find pescado zarandeado: a whole butterflied, chili-marinated fish grilled over smoldering mesquite.
…For Una Vacación Muy Romántica
Three absurdly quaint (and Valentine’s Day–appropriate) towns a few hours from Mexico City.
Street Life in Guanajuato
Buy sweets at Xocola-T Boutique, a chocolate shop the size of your average elevator. At dusk, follow a band of troubadours who'll lead you up all the steep stairs and blind alleys (above). The next day: Ride the funicular up the hill. If you've got a diamond, now's when you break it out.
Dining in San Miguel de Allende
This cobblestoned town has so much great food that Top Chef filmed a finale here. Sample the tacos at Tianguis de los Martes (the Tuesday market), try the tasting menu at Áperi, or hit the roof of Hotel Nena, where you'll soak up both city views and the mole sauce on a suckling pig.
Shopping in Puebla
Forget that Callejón de los Sapos translates to Alley of the Frogs. Just go there. You'll seem like a hero for “discovering” this corridor of antiques shops. Then carry on to El Parián, a seven-days-a-week crafts market, for brilliantly colored ceramics and textiles.
...For the Other Cabo
The towns of Cabo San Lucas and San José del Cabo both sit on the southern tip of the Baja Peninsula. You definitely don't want to pick the wrong one.
Setting
SJDC: Old homes are being converted into spiffy restaurants.
CSL: Culture is generally limited to Bob Marley calf tattoos.
Signature Sound
SJDC: Traditional concerts take place in the central Plaza Mijares, built on an original 18th-century mission.
CSL: Faux mariachi bands will crucify many of your favorite songs.
Plans for Tonight
SJDC: Head to Flora's Field Kitchen for unbelievably fresh farm-to-table food.
CSL: Sammy Hagar's club.
Where to Buy Tequila
SJDC: Curated shops like Los Barriles de Don Malaquias offer nearly 300 brands and blends.
CSL: Anywhere with a horizontal surface.
Where to Stay
SJDC: Intimate, boutiquey Hotel El Ganzo, with its rooftop infinity pool and private beach.
CSL: The ME Cabo, which lists “DJ music” under Services on its website.
Ways You Will Be Relieved of Your Money
SJDC: Golf is big here; try the Palmilla Golf Club's three 9-hole courses.
CSL: Flyboarding, a real thing, which involves a hoverboard connected to a Jet Ski connected to you.
The Beach
SJDC: Playa Palmilla and Playa Acapulquito both boast fantastic scuba diving and snorkeling.
CSL: We cannot begin to prepare you for the sheer volume of Pitbull.
...For the Greatest Restaurant in the World (for a Limited Time Only)
For seven weeks this spring, you won't have to haul your ass to Copenhagen to eat at world-famous Noma. That's because chef-genius René Redzepi and his former pastry chef Rosio Sanchez are opening an outdoor pop-up restaurant on the dreamy Mayan Riviera. What's for dinner? “That's the fun part,” Sanchez says. “We have no idea!” Basically, she and Redzepi will cook food indigenous to the area, figuring it out when they get there. The feeding frenzy starts April 12. It'll be a tasting menu, $600 a head. And you'll just have to trust them.
...For the Sweats
At the end of a hike up Tepozteco Mountain in Tepoztlán, you'll find a 12th-century temple to Tepoztecatl, an Aztec god of drink—or, specifically, pulque, a pre-Hispanic tipple of fermented agave sap, still sold in town. (Try one. Actually, try a few.)
It all makes for an apt intro to an intoxicating place whose presence in Aztec myth supports its status among big-city weekenders as a hippie hideaway. Spas are everywhere in Tepoztlán, and chief among these is the temazcal, an igloo-shaped stone-and-adobe sweat lodge whose form is said to echo Mother Earth's own womb, so that each temazcal experience is a rebirth.
You can get the authentic guided experience at Hotel Teocalli, where a temazcalero leads you through a series of pre-steam chants, stretches, and herb inhalations. Then, as you enter the temazcal—claustrophobes, turn back now—medicinal herbs are burned as well as infused in the water thrown on walls to create near intolerable heat levels. Leafy branches are waved to distribute and adjust the steam, then beaten on you to encourage detoxification. (You'll love it!) Further exfoliation comes courtesy of stones and grasses. After about 20 minutes too long, you exit, lie dazed in a pool, sip tea, and ponder your next pulque.
...For All This Crazy Jungle Stuff!
Until a freak frost in 1962 killed his beloved flowers, Surrealist-art patron and certified eccentric Edward James had been living on a former coffee plantation in the Mexican village of Xilitla among 18,000 orchids. Deciding he'd make a more permanent paradise, James then spent the next two decades constructing 36 WTF-ish concrete structures in the middle of the rain forest. Called Las Pozas for its many spring-fed ponds, it's an outsider-art masterwork: The Watts Towers, Grey Gardens, Gaudí's Barcelona, and Disneyland rolled into one.
No country in the world (not even Kazakhstan) is more misunderstood than the land across the Rio Grande. (We don't even blame Trump.) For whatever reason, gringos always seem to visit only the absolute worst places: all-inclusive tourist hellscapes where you need a wristband to order a watery margarita and the quesadillas come with a side of ketchup. But Mexico has quietly become a world-class travel destination, without sacrificing its character and history—its soul. Why should we fly across an ocean when, right across our border, cities are booming with Europe-level restaurants and parks are packed with Australia-level adventure? It's insane to think that while we've been backpacking through Thailand and foodie-pilgrimaging to Copenhagen, Mexico has been right there all along, getting better (more stable, more progressive, more sophisticated) all the time.
In the past few years, the country's interior has become as compelling as its shoreline. The art scene now rivals anything in the hemisphere. Even though it's close enough for a quick getaway and familiar enough to require zero acclimation, parts of its landscape feel like a different planet. Extravagance abounds if that's your thing, but the country's cheap thrills (e.g., carnitas) offer at least as much primal pleasure. This is, after all, the culture that gave the world chocolate, guacamole, mezcal, and Salma Hayek. It knows how to have a good time.
In these pages, you'll find dozens of other reasons to go right now. So join us as we get re-acquainted with our southern neighbor. Because with every passing day in America, Mexico seems less like the cause of all our problems and more like the solution.
...For the Totally Surreal Wilderness
Chiapas will remind you of your best days outside in Colorado—minus the legal edibles. Much of the state is nature preserves. And most of the action is within driving distance of the charming town of San Cristóbal de las Casas, the perfect place to wind down with the local ceremonial drink, pox, which is to Chiapas what bourbon is to Kentucky.
DAY 1
Trip Out Underground
Head to Sima de las Cotorras just before sunrise, when the thousands of green parakeets that live in this sinkhole—about 500 feet across and deep—rise in spiraling flocks in search of food. Rappel to the bottom and gawk at wall paintings believed to be up to 10,000 years old. Chiapas is littered with other dramatic caves, including El Chorreadero, which you enter like something out of Tomb Raider, descending into a vast network of caverns with underground springs.
DAY 2
Roll Up to the Pyramids
To get a feel for the bonkers topography of Chiapas, where pines battle palms for real estate, sign up for Jaguar Adventours' bike excursion to the Río Totolapa—it starts on a mountaintop and ends at a waterfall. Or, if you're more into hiking, visit the Mayan site of Toniná, the tallest pyramid in Mexico, at almost 250 feet. All the structures (and their 360-degree views) can be explored without a guide; in the States you'd have to sign some kind of death waiver.
DAY 3
Ride a Waterfall
Chiapas may have the most aquatic diversity in Mexico, with countless freshwater bodies and 180 miles of secluded ocean beach. So kayak your way through Lagunas de Montebello, a network of 59 lakes, each a unique and vivid color due to its mineral content. Or raft Agua Azul, a series of stepped waterfalls with up to 50-foot drops. Or (if you're not insane) plunge into Cenote Chucumaltik, a crystalline lake (a sinkhole, really), and dive above petrified trees, a quartz deposit, and an altar to the Virgin Mary.
...For Holbox Island, the Better Cancún
A short, spray-in-your-face boat ride off the Yucatán coast, Holbox is on a cigar-shaped spit so narrow you can practically heave a coconut from shore to shore. With golf carts for taxis and sand for pavement, it is literally where the streets have no name. All you do is sunbathe and swim, taking daily lunch breaks to eat the life-changing ceviche at a mom-and-pop stand called La Chingada. At night you swim again, only this time the water is bioluminescent; turquoise sparks fly off your fingertips as you wave them through the water and realize that you don't miss civilization even one little bit.
...For Mexico City’s Magnificent Transformation
As the city becomes a mecca of art and food, new neighborhoods keep popping up as symbols of the revolution: first Condesa, then Roma, and now Colonia Juárez, a district of rehabbed mansions. Here, author Jorge Pedro Uribe (the Anthony Bourdain of Mexico City) maps the highlights.
Bar Milán and Parker & Lenox “Parker & Lenox is a great speakeasy for jazz, swing, and other sounds of the '30s and '40s; Bar Milán is a classic that I hope can survive.”
Amaya The hottest restaurant opening of 2016, bar none.
Barbería Capital Because every hood needs a hipster barbershop.
Expendio Records The spot for underground vinyl and rowdy parties.
Panadería Rosetta “Havre is kind of the ‘gentrifier’ street, and Rosetta bakery is the best place to hike your sugar—and pleasure—levels.”
Café Gaby's “It might be the only old-school coffee shop like this in the neighborhood. I love the collection of old coffee mills and molinillos, which are hot-chocolate beaters.”
Marso Gallery Housed in an ornate old mansion, it's one of a handful of contemporary-art galleries to open in the area.
Corner of Berlín & Versalles “It's one of the prettiest and most historic parts of the neighborhood.”
...For a Peaceful Villa (With No Mega-Resort in Sight)__
You can have pretty much the same experience in an Acapulco resort that you can in Jamaica. So find a place that harmonizes with its surroundings instead of overshadowing them. A half-hour car ride up the coast from Tulum, Hotel Esencia was built as a retreat for an Italian duchess. Its manicured grounds, including a semi-private beach, are wedged between the gnarly jungle and the sparkling sea. And all lodgings are either suites or villas. In short, Esencia is as far removed from an Acapulco high-rise as it gets.
Hey, Enrique Olvera, you're the super-chef behind restaurants Pujol in Mexico City and Moxi in San Miguel de Allende. Where should we be eating next?
“One of the pioneer cooks in Baja is Jair Téllez, who opened Laja in 2001. It's got great natural wines and homemade bread. I also like the avant-garde techniques at Néctar in Mérida. And there's Restaurante Alcade in Guadalajara, which does Mexican flavor at its best.”
…For the Freaky Solitude
What you see in the picture all the way at the top of the page is not some new glamping situation in Marfa. It's not Mars 100 years after Elon Musk plants his flag. It's Mexico. Encuentro Guadalupe, to be exact—a design hotel that's easily the strangest, most exhilarating base for exploring Baja's burgeoning wine country. Each of the 20 “eco-lofts” (starting at $275) is a freestanding pod, reachable only by shuttle and/or hiking trail. There's no TV, no ice machine. Just you, a view, and the realization that you're doing Mexico the right way. For more on that, keep reading.
...For Outdoor Nirvana in One Epic Ride
Mexico's most famous passenger train—nicknamed El Chepe—makes the 400-mile trek from the parched dunes of Chihuahua through the Sierra Madre and into the sugarcane fields of Los Mochis in about 16 hours. Here's what you'll see along the way.
1. Westworld IRL
After trundling across a cowboy landscape that Pancho Villa once roamed, you reach the town of Creel and a 4,134-foot tunnel—only the second-longest of 87 you'll encounter.
2. Just-as-Grand Canyon
Divisadero is where Copper Canyon cleaves, revealing its awesome emptiness, so hop off and 'gram it. Bonus: Vendors huddle by the track, heating blue-corn tortillas over smoky fires.
3. Quick Break
In Cerocahui, a remote farming village of about 1,500 people, spend a night at San Isidro Lodge, an eco-retreat that features an electricity-less meditation cabin.
4. Quick Workout
Six thousand feet below the canyon's lip in Urique, the 50-mile Caballo Blanco Ultramarathon, memorialized in the best-seller Born to Run, draws hundreds of locos every spring.
5. Vertigo!
As the mountains spill into rivers, you cross Río Chinipas on a spine-tingling bridge 335 feet above the water.
6. Big Reward
Down by the Sea of Cortez, you'll find pescado zarandeado: a whole butterflied, chili-marinated fish grilled over smoldering mesquite.
…For Una Vacación Muy Romántica
Three absurdly quaint (and Valentine’s Day–appropriate) towns a few hours from Mexico City.
Street Life in Guanajuato
Buy sweets at Xocola-T Boutique, a chocolate shop the size of your average elevator. At dusk, follow a band of troubadours who'll lead you up all the steep stairs and blind alleys (above). The next day: Ride the funicular up the hill. If you've got a diamond, now's when you break it out.
Dining in San Miguel de Allende
This cobblestoned town has so much great food that Top Chef filmed a finale here. Sample the tacos at Tianguis de los Martes (the Tuesday market), try the tasting menu at Áperi, or hit the roof of Hotel Nena, where you'll soak up both city views and the mole sauce on a suckling pig.
Shopping in Puebla
Forget that Callejón de los Sapos translates to Alley of the Frogs. Just go there. You'll seem like a hero for “discovering” this corridor of antiques shops. Then carry on to El Parián, a seven-days-a-week crafts market, for brilliantly colored ceramics and textiles.
...For the Other Cabo
The towns of Cabo San Lucas and San José del Cabo both sit on the southern tip of the Baja Peninsula. You definitely don't want to pick the wrong one.
Setting
SJDC: Old homes are being converted into spiffy restaurants.
CSL: Culture is generally limited to Bob Marley calf tattoos.
Signature Sound
SJDC: Traditional concerts take place in the central Plaza Mijares, built on an original 18th-century mission.
CSL: Faux mariachi bands will crucify many of your favorite songs.
Plans for Tonight
SJDC: Head to Flora's Field Kitchen for unbelievably fresh farm-to-table food.
CSL: Sammy Hagar's club.
Where to Buy Tequila
SJDC: Curated shops like Los Barriles de Don Malaquias offer nearly 300 brands and blends.
CSL: Anywhere with a horizontal surface.
Where to Stay
SJDC: Intimate, boutiquey Hotel El Ganzo, with its rooftop infinity pool and private beach.
CSL: The ME Cabo, which lists “DJ music” under Services on its website.
Ways You Will Be Relieved of Your Money
SJDC: Golf is big here; try the Palmilla Golf Club's three 9-hole courses.
CSL: Flyboarding, a real thing, which involves a hoverboard connected to a Jet Ski connected to you.
The Beach
SJDC: Playa Palmilla and Playa Acapulquito both boast fantastic scuba diving and snorkeling.
CSL: We cannot begin to prepare you for the sheer volume of Pitbull.
...For the Greatest Restaurant in the World (for a Limited Time Only)
For seven weeks this spring, you won't have to haul your ass to Copenhagen to eat at world-famous Noma. That's because chef-genius René Redzepi and his former pastry chef Rosio Sanchez are opening an outdoor pop-up restaurant on the dreamy Mayan Riviera. What's for dinner? “That's the fun part,” Sanchez says. “We have no idea!” Basically, she and Redzepi will cook food indigenous to the area, figuring it out when they get there. The feeding frenzy starts April 12. It'll be a tasting menu, $600 a head. And you'll just have to trust them.
...For the Sweats
At the end of a hike up Tepozteco Mountain in Tepoztlán, you'll find a 12th-century temple to Tepoztecatl, an Aztec god of drink—or, specifically, pulque, a pre-Hispanic tipple of fermented agave sap, still sold in town. (Try one. Actually, try a few.)
It all makes for an apt intro to an intoxicating place whose presence in Aztec myth supports its status among big-city weekenders as a hippie hideaway. Spas are everywhere in Tepoztlán, and chief among these is the temazcal, an igloo-shaped stone-and-adobe sweat lodge whose form is said to echo Mother Earth's own womb, so that each temazcal experience is a rebirth.
You can get the authentic guided experience at Hotel Teocalli, where a temazcalero leads you through a series of pre-steam chants, stretches, and herb inhalations. Then, as you enter the temazcal—claustrophobes, turn back now—medicinal herbs are burned as well as infused in the water thrown on walls to create near intolerable heat levels. Leafy branches are waved to distribute and adjust the steam, then beaten on you to encourage detoxification. (You'll love it!) Further exfoliation comes courtesy of stones and grasses. After about 20 minutes too long, you exit, lie dazed in a pool, sip tea, and ponder your next pulque.
...For All This Crazy Jungle Stuff!
Until a freak frost in 1962 killed his beloved flowers, Surrealist-art patron and certified eccentric Edward James had been living on a former coffee plantation in the Mexican village of Xilitla among 18,000 orchids. Deciding he'd make a more permanent paradise, James then spent the next two decades constructing 36 WTF-ish concrete structures in the middle of the rain forest. Called Las Pozas for its many spring-fed ponds, it's an outsider-art masterwork: The Watts Towers, Grey Gardens, Gaudí's Barcelona, and Disneyland rolled into one.
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