Mexico Hotels

Mexico is a traveler's dream. Whatever your pleasure - bustling cities, historic villages, lush jungles, imposing mountains, crystal white beaches that line azure blue seas, or the mysteries of the past - Mexico is sure to please. Often stereotyped by those who really don't know it, Mexico offers everything from world class accommodations and entertainment, to budget trips for the thrifty and adventurous. Mexico hotels offer the same wide variety: penthouse suites with ocean views to small rooms with a shared bath. The better hotels in Mexico all have bilingual staffs so your command of Spanish does not have to be perfect.

Mexico City is one of the largest cities in the world. Mexico's best and worst ingredients are all here: music and noise, brown air and green parks, colonial palaces and skyscrapers, world-renowned museums and ever-spreading slums. The city's historic centre is the Plaza de la Constitucian, or Zacalo. The plaza was paved in the 1520s by Hernan Cortas, using stones from the temples and palaces of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlin he'd destroyed, and on which Mexico City was built.

Guadalajara, the country's second-largest city, is the source of many Mexican traditions: mariachi music, tequila, the Mexican Hat Dance, broad-brimmed sombrero hats and the Mexican rodeo. The lovely city has many of the attractions of Mexico City - a vibrant culture, fine museums and galleries, handsome historic buildings, exciting nightlife and good places to stay and eat - but few of the capital's problems. Highlights include the giant, twin-towered cathedral and the lovely plazas that surround it, the Instituto Cultural de Cabanas and its frescoes by Jose Clemente Orozco, the Plaza de los Mariachis and the market towns of Tlaquepaque and Tonala.

For decades Acapulco has been the principal resort town in Mexico, and each generation has brought a new wave of development to the shoreline. But the glittery nightlife and famous daredevil cliff-divers have remained constant over the years. The beaches are the big draw at Acapulco, and most are content to limit their sightseeing to white sands, blue seas and tanned bodies. For variety there are museums, aquaria, a fun park, and the famous divers of La Quebrada.

Today, many who are seeking the pleasures of the beaches do so in the Yucatan Peninsula. The coastal state of Quintana Roo attracts plane-loads of sun-loving tourists to its islands and white-sand Caribbean beaches, particularly Cozumel, Playa del Carmen and, party central, Cancun. The stunning cliff-top ruins at Tulum, overlooking a palm-fringed beach and turquoise sea, attract their fair share of visitors too.

Of course, we have said nothing of the Mayan and Aztec cultures which have left their thumbprints across the Mexican countryside. Baja California has many delights outside of its most famous tourist town: Tiajuana. Oaxaca and Taxco are great daytrips. Mexico has so many fascinating elements that it's difficult to cover them all. But you may want to try, especially since the prices (away from the major resort areas) are some of the most affordable in the world.