If you only have a couple of days, this is the shortlist: the ten things that, between them, explain what kind of city this is. They are deliberately spread across the three layers the city is built from — pre-Hispanic, colonial and modern — rather than being ten versions of the same thing.
The unmissable four. The Zócalo, one of the largest squares in the world, with the cathedral and the Templo Mayor on the same block. The National Museum of Anthropology, which is not a museum you fit into an hour. The Bosque de Chapultepec, with its castle on the hill. And Xochimilco on a Sunday, when the canals fill with trajineras.
The rest. The cathedral roof and bell towers; Madero street and the old Franciscan quarter; the cobbles of San Ángel; contemporary architecture in Polanco; and the Turíbus, which is genuinely useful on a first day for placing everything else.
How to fit it in. Group by area and never cross the city twice in one day: centre on one day, Chapultepec and Polanco on another, the south on a third. Several major museums close on Mondays, and Sundays are free for residents, which means crowds. Use the Metro.
