Mexico City is a city of twenty million people where you are never far from a green space: it holds urban woods of several hundred hectares, neighbourhood parks laid out in the 1920s, high-mountain national parks inside its own boundaries and a canal system on the World Heritage list. These 40 experiences are there to help you choose which one fits your day.
The essentials. The Bosque de Chapultepec is the largest urban park in Latin America and takes a full day: castle, lake, free zoo, museums. Parque México, in the Condesa, is the other reference: an art deco layout from the 1920s on the old racecourse, and the heart of neighbourhood life. The Viveros de Coyoacán, a national tree nursery turned park, is where the city goes running in the morning.
Going further. To the south, the Desierto de los Leones and Los Dinamos offer genuine pine forest less than an hour from the centre, above 2,500 metres. In Xochimilco these are no longer parks but canals and chinampas. And to the north, Parque Tezozómoc reproduces the valley's old lake system in miniature.
Practical information. Most public parks are free and open early, often from 06:00: that is the best moment, before the midday heat and pollution. The mountain national parks are best visited in the dry season and early in the day. From June to September it rains almost every afternoon.
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