Visit to Xochimilco: the little Venice of Mexico

Time in Mexico goes at weird speeds, and, as weeks are quite boring I'm going to make sure to make my weekends worth it

Today Varun, Min Hwee and myself have gone to Xochimilco. Located in the south of Mexico city (~30min cab ride), this maze of canals was originally a lake. The Aztec (or Mayas, I don't remember what the boat driver told me), back at their time, started to put soil and sand in the lake to gain land to cultivate. During the dry seasons they would plant trees in those artificial islands in order to avoid the sand to go away. Over the time, the lake was not really discernible, and only remains the 184km worth of canals that we can visit today. The site is actually considered as a World Heritage site by UNESCO, and families and friends go there during the weekends for relaxing time.

In our case, we reached there around noon, and rented a whole boat for the 3 of us (around 600 pesos in total) for approximately 2h. Funny thing about the place: you basically go through the canals, and all along the way you will have the merchants and other people (like music bands) that will offer their service, hook to your boat and such. We just ordered some corn along the way as we were a bit hungry. We also stopped in one of the gardens to see the flowers. Nothing exceptional, but nice flowers!

Very relaxing time indeed, and I loved the colors of the boats.

Oh, some story our boat rider told me along the way. I asked him why there were some trees with very creepy tolls hooked to them. Apparently, far away in the canals there is a 70 year old guy who hangs these tolls in the trees of his island. He says that they look at him while he is planting the flowers and such, and that he believes they actually move their eyes to him.

You will find the pictures in the Picasa album