A Four Hour Tour

Just take Uber from the airport they said! It’s so much easier they said!

Too easy!

The last time I landed in Mexico City I left the airport on foot and walked a kilometer in the middle of nowhere to the subway station, I ended up in the middle of a morning rush hour unlike anything I had ever seen, it was amazing, but I didn’t feel the need to recreate the experience.

This time I decided to take the bus from the airport to a subway station on the line that goes to my Airbnb.

Probably easiest to relate the rest of the voyage in point form:

wandered the airport, end to end, looking for signs for the city bus. The wayfinding in Mexico City International is staggeringly bad.
found signs for bus and followed them out of the airport, nope, realized these are charter buses.
wandered the airport again, eventually found one tiny sign for the bus stop, followed sign out of airport, into taxi area.
there is no bus stop, wandered around for ten minutes, found bus stop, 200 yards away, behind a post, with one tiny marker.
according to Google the #4 bus comes every 5 minutes.
waited 5 minutes.
waited 5 minutes.
waited 5 minutes.
waited 5 minutes.
waited 5 minutes.
sigh, no bus, jumped in taxi.
told driver to take me to San Lazaro Metro station.
driver was very nice, practiced my Spanish with him while he got lost and had to ask people for directions, twice.
get to station, rougher part of town, driver is warning me, making sure I’m ok on the subway.
entered station, realized I’m in the bus area of the station, I need the subway. My mistake was following the signs with pictures of trains on them…… the rapidbus is nicknamed Trenbus and the logo is… a train….
walked out of the bus area, found the subway area, can’t find Line 1 – Pink Line anywhere.
wandered and wandered and wandered, pack is getting very heavy.
found a train, some signs are in pink, some are in green, I’m tired.
took train, wrong train, changed trains back to station.
wandered around, found the entry for Line 1, and found that it’s boarded up.
hilarious language barrier exchange with security guard, he explained there is construction.
realized the taxi driver wasn’t worried about my safety, he was trying to make sure I understood the subway isn’t running.
headed back to the Trenebus… where I was…. funny looks from the guards as I go through the turnstiles again.
took Trenbus for about an hour until it met another subway station closer to my Airbnb.
found boarded up subway station, learned Line 1, the main line, the line I got my Airbnb close to on purpose, is totally shut down until March 1.
tried to get a bus going my general direction, I’m burnt out, cannot figure out the buses, none have standard signage, none give you any useful information.
requested an Uber.
arrived at my Airbnb, 4 hours and 10km of walking later.