There are many things for us to see and do in Mérida. So, let’s dig in! The city center of Mérida is best known for its large main square with park. Here tourists and local people meet equally and at any time of the day or night. In addition, the city center is characterized by the colonial era, since Mérida was an important trading city in the immediate vicinity of the port in Progreso on the Caribbean coast during the Spanish occupation.

Sights in Mérida

Cathedral of Mérida

Once again, we visit the cathedral during a church service. With four or five services a day, the chance to meet a time slot one is relatively high. Accordingly, our visit is only short and from the back row. The cathedral of Mérida captivates mainly by its outer appearance and less by a special development in the interior of the cathedral.

Government building of the administration of Yucatán

The administration of the state of Yucatán is housed in a beautiful colonialist building. Again, we observe the typical construction of a rectangular building with a courtyard that is quite large in relation. In addition, there is the gallery on the second floor. Many impressive paintings are exhibited here and is free to visit. They have a more profound meaning and represent, from a modern point of view, the struggle between the Mayan natives and the Spanish colonizers in the past. They are very impressive paintings in a memorable style. We like the paintings as well as the Palacio exceptionally well.

Casa Montejo Museum

The Casa Montejo Museum exhibits original colonialist utensils and home furnishings. Because of the colonial past, which still characterizes parts of Mérida today, it is interesting to see the interior of the colonial houses. Many items, of course, came from the wealthiest of the colonial masters and are appropriately ostentatious and extensive. The name of the museum comes from the next point of interest, the Paseo de Montejo.

Paseo de Montejo

The Paseo de Montejo was planned early in the modern history of Mérida and the boulevard is accordingly wide. With six lanes plus a central reservation and wide sidewalks on the sides, this street is based on world-famous models such as the Champs-Élysées. Adjacent to the street are still many magnificent buildings of the rich and important people of Mérida from around 1900. So, we stop a few times on the way to the northern end of the street with a magnificent work of art in the middle of the final traffic circle to admire the architecture from the past and capture it on pictures.

City life in Mérida

Mérida is the largest city on the Yucatán Peninsula and the available range of restaurants and stores is correspondingly large. We don’t miss that and enjoy the city life and the advantages of bigger tourism streams for one or two days. Mérida is also known as the gateway to the Mayan world. From here you can drive to Chichén Itzá, for example, within a reasonable time. This is probably the plan for the next destination of ours.
The atmosphere in Mérida is more relaxed than in many other cities in Mexico. For us, this is a pleasant change. We can’t pinpoint the exact reason for this. But we notice the omnipresent surveillance at the crossroads and the very regular patrolling of the police. This could be an indication of the increased security and thus relaxedness of the population.

By the necessity of errands for our Campervan Ben we decide to settle everything being in Mérida, since as said, the supply here for Central America is nevertheless very good. We can ask a mechanic to exchange a broken joint at the front axle. The needed spare part for our Mercedes Sprinter is also available immediately the next day and does not drag out the repair unnecessarily.
Further, we can order a mosquito net from a large online mail order company and also get it delivered. The difficulty here is always that we have no fixed address. And a decent campsite where we want to stand longer is apparently not available in Mérida.
As a last task, we also face the problem of the weakening suspension on the rear axle of our campervan. Due to the many speed bumps – topes in Spanish – and the permanent load as a camper, the springs are compressed earlier than expected to such an extent that we have practically no more spring travel on the rear axle. We guess we’ll have to have that done. Especially in view of the fact that the really bad roads are probably still to come. Again, also for this we find a suitable workshop which can regenerate not only the springs, but install directly an additional reinforcement. With that we shouldn’t be back at the same point with a “hanging ass” on our Mercedes Sprinter in a few months.

Two weeks pass quickly in one and the same city. Our summary of Mérida is positive on the whole. We were able to do a lot of things, often park our car directly at the roadside and stay overnight very central and very cheap. We stayed in Mérida with pleasure for a moment longer than planned. In two weeks, a little bit of familiarity comes up again. Familiarity often comes a little too short while traveling, so this is something positive for us right now.