Mexico City in 4 days

One of the largest squares in the world, laid over the ceremonial centre of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital destroyed in 1521.

Uncovered after electricity workers struck a 3.25-metre stone disc of Coyolxauhqui in 1978, the twin temple of Tlaloc and Huitzilopochtli at Tenochtitlan's heart.

A white Carrara marble palace built from 1904 to 1934, Art Nouveau outside and Art Deco within, with a Tiffany glass curtain showing two volcanoes.

A hilltop castle of 1785, in turn a military academy, Emperor Maximilian's residence and a presidential home, now the National Museum of History.

Pedro Ramírez Vázquez's 1964 building, its courtyard shaded by a concrete umbrella on one pillar, holding the Sun Stone, Pakal's jade mask and Olmec heads.

The Casa Azul in Coyoacán, where Frida Kahlo was born in 1907 and died in 1954, its cobalt walls around a patio of cacti.

Painted flat-bottomed boats poled along the canals and Aztec floating gardens 25 km south of the centre, with mariachis and food sellers pulling alongside.

A city of over 100,000 people around 450 AD, long abandoned when the Aztecs named it, with the 65-metre Pyramid of the Sun.