Chapultepec

Chapultepec – Nahuatl for Grasshopper Hill – is a forested hilltop just southwest of central Mexico City, anchoring one of the largest urban parks in the Western Hemisphere. Aztec tlatoani prized the site for its freshwater springs and built summer residences here; Moctezuma I commissioned an aqueduct to Tenochtitlan in the 15th century. The crest is crowned by Castillo de Chapultepec, originally a bishop's seat, later a military academy and the residence of Emperor Maximilian I, now the National Museum of History. Around it spread the zoo, the National Museum of Anthropology and gigantic ahuehuete cypresses, some reportedly over 500 years old. On weekends the entire city seems to converge here.