Updated Itinerary

This is our tentative daily schedule at a glance. All timings and distances are approximate. Our tour staff will make daily announcements with specifics and times during the trip. Note that our itinerary may shift due to the weather or to take advantage of unexpected opportunities.

A typical day’s activities begin with a continental buffet breakfast. We then set out around 8:00 a.m. for our all-day excursion, armed with sunscreen, sunglasses, water hat, camera and our comfortable walking shoes. There will be some coach travel, with up to 3 miles of walking and perhaps climbing stairs without handrails. We stop along the way to enjoy lunch at a local restaurant. After lunch, we are off again in the afternoon for an excursion before returning to our hotel. Dinners are usually served quite late, around 8:00 p.m.

Meals included in the program are indicated next to the hotel name with the following designations:

B = Breakfast          L = Lunch                D = Dinner              R = Reception

Wednesday, September 4                                                                                                 

Depart U.S. ✈ Mexico City, Mexico                                                                             

Fly from your home city to Mexico City. Upon arrival transfer to the hotel.

7:15 p.m.  Meet in the lobby and take a short walk to our welcome dinner at Agua & Sal. 

Hyatt Recency Polanco (R, D)

Thursday, September 5

Mexico City 

6:30 a.m.           A buffet breakfast begins in the Rulfo Restaurant.

8:00 a.m.     Our tour manager, Nancy Kraemer, will make some welcome remarks before our first lecture from Faculty Leader, Ana Minian.

Following the lecture travel by bus to Mexico City’s historical core, where we begin a walking tour examining Mexico City’s foundations and colonial past. See Templo Mayor, one of the main temples of the former capital of the Aztec empire, and the Metropolitan Cathedral, the first and largest cathedral in the Americas. We also visit the Palace of Fine Arts with its immense murals by world-famous artists, including Rufino Tamayo and Diego Rivera. Lastly, visit the Diego Rivera Mural Museum, home to one of his most famous works, Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in the Alameda Central.

Continue to Coyoacán (approximately a 40-minute drive, depending on traffic) and enjoy lunch overlooking the neighborhood’s bustling plaza,

From here walk a short distance to the final residence of Frida Kahlo, now known as the Museo Casa Azul (split into 2 groups with staggered times). Time permitting, en route back to the hotel, stop at the Ciudadela Market, where hundreds of stands offer Mexican handcrafts and folk art.

Tonight, dine in the restaurant, Azulisimo, of acclaimed chef Ricardo Muñoz Zurita.

Hyatt Recency Polanco (B, L, D)

Friday, September 6

Mexico City                                                                                                                                 

6:30 a.m.           A buffet breakfast begins in the Rulfo Restaurant.

8.30 am.           

Begin our day with a panel discussion arranged with the help of the Stanford Alumni Club of Mexico City.  We will be joined by Viridiana Rios, teacher of U.S.-Mexico Politics and writer for the European newspaper, El Pais and the Mexican newspaper, Milenio and Patricia Mercado, a Senator in Mexico and the first women to run for president in Mexico in 2006.  There will be additional speakers handpicked by the Stanford Club, and the discussion will be moderated by Stanford alum and political writer, Jose Luis Sabau, '22.  

Following our panel discussion, depart the hotel to the Museo de Arte Popular. This folk-art museum is a wonderful space to get acquainted with the diversity of Mexican craftsmanship. Our guided tour here will be led by curator Fernanda Yáñez.

After lunch, meet with staff at the Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Centre for Human Rights (Centro Prodh), a non-profit civil association working to promote structural changes to achieve human rights in Mexico.  Continue to Museo Jumex, which houses one of Latin America's largest private contemporary art collections, including works by Andy Warhol, Martin Kippenberger, Cy Twombly, and Damien Hirst.

This evening return to the hotel and meet with Lynda Martinez del Campo, a cultural historian, writer, and university professor for a talk on Mexican Muralism. We expect the talk to end around 6:45 p.m.

Dinner is at your leisure; you can choose from a variety of restaurants in Mexico City.

Hyatt Recency Polanco (B, L)

Saturday, September 7

Mexico City and Teotihuacán 

6:30 a.m.           A buffet breakfast begins in the Rulfo Restaurant.

7:15 a.m.          

Depart early this morning for Teotihuacán, a large and majestic archaeological site located about 25 miles north of Mexico City. It is famous for its large pyramids dedicated to the sun and the moon, but the site also contains beautiful murals and carvings and several museums through which you can explore the city's fascinating history. This is one of the largest and most important archaeological sites in Mexico. Construction at Teotihuacán began around 200 BC. Since the ethnic group and the language spoken by the inhabitants of Teotihuacán is unknown, they are referred to simply as "Teotihuacános." At its peak between 300 and 600 CE, this was one of the biggest cities in the world, with around 200,000 inhabitants. The Aztecs considered Teotihuacán a sacred site even though it had been abandoned long before their time. Teotihuacán is the name that was given to the site by the Aztecs and it means "city of the gods" or "where men become gods."

Enjoy a basic, yet delicious lunch at a local taco stand before taking a walking tour with Street Art Chilango, a group dedicated to documenting the urban art, graffiti, and murals in Mexico City.

This evening dinner is at your leisure, you can choose from a variety of restaurants in Mexico City.

Hyatt Recency Polanco (B, L)

Sunday, September 8

Mexico City                                                                                                                                 

6:30 a.m.           A buffet breakfast begins in the Rulfo Restaurant.

8:30 a.m.           Enjoy our second lecture from Faculty Leader, Ana Minian.

Depart this morning for Museo Nacional de Antropologia. Situated within the lush surroundings of Bosque de Chapultepec, the museum has a massive Mesoamerican artifact collection, and today we will concentrate on the Aztec and Mayan halls, which contain world-famous pieces from Mexico's pre-Hispanic period, such as replicas of the murals that once adorned Teotihuacán (the famed pyramids on the outskirts of the city which we will also be visiting), the Piedra del Sol—the Aztec Calendar Stone—and the 16th-century statue of Xochipilli (the Aztec god of art, as well as games, beauty, dance, and maize).

Enjoy lunch at the museum before continuing on to Casa Pedregal. Designed by Luis Barragán this is one of the greatest Modernist masterpieces of Mexico. Back in the 1940s, when Barragán purchased the real estate cheaply from the government, it was a desolate petrified lava field. In the years that ensued, it served as the canvas for an ambitious modernist urbanization project, in which Barragán and his contemporaries sought to develop the area while preserving the integrity of its unique ecosystem.

This evening enjoy a private dinner at Nueve Nueve.

Hyatt Recency Polanco (B, L, D) - Please remember to settle any bills with the hotel this evening.

Monday, September 9

Mexico City / Oaxaca

6:30 a.m.           A buffet breakfast begins in the Rulfo Restaurant.

8:00 a.m.           Bring your bags down to the lobby. If you need assistance, please talk to your tour manager, Nancy Kraemer.

8:15 a.m.           Depart the hotel for the airport.

10:55 a.m.         Aeromexico Flight 1044 departs from Mexico City to Oaxaca.

12:14 p.m.        Arrive Oaxaca and collect luggage.

Upon arrival drive to explore the city’s folk art at San Martín Tilcajete.  After lunch, visit a workshop to see the creation of alebrijes, the fancifully painted wooden animals that represent spirits in Zapotec culture.

Continue on to San Bartolo Coyotepec, a Zapotec town famous for producing barro negro, a polished black pottery. Visit the workshop of Casa Negra studio, where the Pedro Martínez Family, an extraordinarily talented and productive clan of artists, create purely decorative pieces in the black pottery for which their pueblo is renowned. The family is distinguished by a remarkable diversity of individual styles. The parents, Antonio and Glafira, and their children and grandchildren, have each developed his or her own type of work.

Drive to Oaxaca and check into the hotel.

This evening have dinner at a local restaurant, a short walk away.

Grand Fiesta America Oaxaca (B, L, D)

Tuesday, September 10

Oaxaca                                                                                                                                           

7:00 a.m.           Breakfast buffet is available in the La Distral restaurant.

Attend our third and final lecture from Faculty Leader, Ana Minian.

After the lecture, depart on foot for a walking tour of Oaxaca to include the church of Santo Domingo and on to the San Pablo Center, housed in a 16th-century Dominican monastery, stopping along the way to try tejate, a ceremonial drink of cacao, corn, cinnamon, and mamey fruit.

For lunch, drive to Itanoní Antojeria y Tortilleria, a favorite of Alice Waters, where heirloom corn varieties are used to make extraordinary versions of antojitos, the corn tortilla-based small dishes that are the heart of the Mexican menu. Continue to the village of Teotitlan and meet with the Isaac Vasquez Family weavers who worked together with the master painter Francisco Toledo on the revival of the natural dyeing techniques. Their work is characterized for its high quality and creativity. They have several looms of multiple sizes where the group can see the spinning, weaving process and some yarns being dyed. Stop at a mezcal distillery before returning to Oaxaca.

This evening enjoy dinner at your leisure.

Grand Fiesta America Oaxaca (B, L)

Wednesday, September 11

Oaxaca                                                                                                                                           

7:00 a.m.           Breakfast buffet is available in the La Distral restaurant.

Today, venture to Monte Albán to tour this ancient Zapotec metropolis that was founded in the 6th century BCE. Explore the terraces, pyramids, and canals that extend over some four miles.

After lunch at the site, return to Oaxaca for an afternoon at leisure before gathering to toast our journey at a farewell dinner at Casa Oaxaca.  

Grand Fiesta America Oaxaca (B, L, D)

Thursday, September 12                                                                                                     

Oaxaca ✈ Home                                                                                                                      

Following breakfast, fly from Oaxaca to your home country. Your tour manager will provide your transfer time the day before.