Mexico City, Mexico

Diary:

Today we slept in, a bit jetlagged I suppose.

We visited the Australian Embassy to see if they had any advice for buying a 4WD in Mexico and driving it all the way through Central and South America. Their official position was "You would be absolutely crazy to attempt this." After chatting for half an hour I walked away with the distinct impression that the embassy official was pretty negative about all kinds of travel around Central & South America, not just via car! The list of possible dangers she reeled off were endless. But at the end, reluctantly, I had to concede that it was going to be really hard, probably impossible, for a non-Spanish speaker like myself to negotiate all the issues involved: buying, registering, insuring, crossing borders, and finally selling in another foreign country. I had some vague notion that it would probably take lots of bribing too, and while I was cool with all that, I realized that my limited Spanish would be inadequate even to bribe an official! If I couldn't find an agent to help me get started, it just wasn't going to happen. Too bad. Looks like now we will plan to do most of our traveling in this part of the world via public transport. We'll probably live a little longer too.

After the embassy we went to the nearby Museo Nacional de Antropologia, a fascinating place which pretty much consumed the rest of our day. We learned all about the ancient Aztec and Mayan civilizations, and how the Spanish came and invaded and kicked their butts and destroyed everything, all in the name of Christianity of course. Yet another chapter of violence in the history of our very confused, and no doubt doomed, species.

We walked home along the busy Paseo de la Reforma, making a side trip into the Zona Rosa (Pink zone) for a delicious and filling dinner at the Korean BBQ restaurant Cheung Ki Wa.

Photos: (click on images to see full size)