Travelers Guide to Yucatán

MERIDA THE WHITE CITY

Capital city of the State of Yucatan is the home of trade in southern Mexico and also a tourist destination of the utmost importance. Long known as the White City because of the  neatness and cleanliness of its streets and people, it has been a still is a mandatory gate for incoming and outgoing visitors.

Founded by spaniards in 1542 upon the remains of the ancient Mayan city of  Ichcaanziho, it was named Merida by the conquistadors as it resembled the Merida of Spain. 

They also thoughtlessly built their homes, temples and official edifices using the holy carved stones from the mayan grand constructions based on what seems today the irresponsible idea of imposing their own culture and faith in these lands.

Whitin the kaleidoscopical mosaic formed by the variuos regions of the country, the people of Merida outstand for their unusual and sincere hospitality combined with the dignity and pride of both their mayan and spanish heritage.

Merida is the ideal city for both business and pleasure as travellers can breathe here an air of relaxation and safety to make them feel at home.

Merida graciously combines the statelines of the old with the pragmatism of the new, the respect for tradition as opposed to the inevitable but necessary invation of progress. 

Strolling around Merida´s sites of interest: museums, quaint parks, market places, department stores, boutiques,curios shops and typical clothes stablishments, makes traveller wonder whether they had not missed a whole vatiety of  possibilities.

The cool evenings of Merida turn out to be fascinating experiences: open outside cafes, airconditioned de luxe restaurants; live serenades and concerts, discoteques, nightclubs or buggy horse rides. 

Downtown on sundays is free of traffic and both visitors and native can walk all around, up and down, so that he or she can get that particular piece of popular art or attend to one of many folk shows going on.

Food is something else again, and any day, at any time, a yucatecan dish can turn into an unforgettable pleasant experience. A city tour may wishly start in the zocalo with a visit to the Gobernment Palace and its famous murals. 

Also a House of  Montejo, founder of the city, whose facade with a portico built of carved stone might be the most important monument of the XVI century civil architecture of Mexico, built in the purest plateresque tradition. 

The Museum of Contemporary Art is located at one side of the Cathedral and offers permanent exhibitions of pictorial and other forms of art. 

A so  called tourist corridor might follow, walking straight on 60 street to visit Parks Hidalgo, Santa Lucia and Santa Ana, down to Paseo Montejo Boulevard, Merida´s main avenue, flanked by French styled old chateaux which mutely tell of the grandeur of the henequen boom in Yucatan at the end of the nineteenth and early the twentieth centuries.

Other places of interest are the Palacio  Canton, the Ermita (chapel) of  Santa Isabel, the zoo of the Centenario, as also some of the XVII haciendas in the surroundings.

Lodging in Merida is prepared to satisfy all: clean, economical inns, luxurious hotels, travel agencies, car rentals, busses, guided tours to the archaeological zones, and restaurants are readily available.

For more information visit:

Merida Yucatan Hotels and Travel Guide

www.meridayucatanhotels.com

and

Travel Yucatan

www.travel-yucatan.com