Cuernavaca

Cuernavaca has been the escape hatch of the capital for five centuries - Aztec emperors kept gardens here, Cortes built his palace here, and chilangos still pour downhill on Fridays for the climate the tourist board trademarked as eternal spring: a perpetual 20-something degrees that keeps bougainvillea and jacaranda in permanent riot. The fortress-like Palacio de Cortes on the main plaza, begun in 1526 atop a tribute-collecting Aztec platform, is among the oldest civil buildings in the Americas and holds a museum under a Rivera mural cycle of the conquest painted on its loggia. A block away, the 1520s cathedral compound - a UNESCO-listed fortress monastery - hides austere frescoes of martyrdoms in Japan, evidence of Mexico's early Pacific ties. The Jardin Borda next door, an eighteenth-century pleasure garden of terraces and pools, hosted Maximilian and Carlota's court summers. Around them: sunken lanes, garden restaurants, and the papaya-and-pool weekend culture that is half the city's identity.

What you actually see

• Palacio de Cortes - the 1526 fortress palace and its Rivera loggia.
• The cathedral compound - fortress walls and the Japan-martyrs frescoes.
• Jardin Borda - terraced imperial gardens of fountains and mangoes.
• The garden city itself - flowers, courtyards and perpetual spring.

When to go

Any month works - that is the point; November to April avoids afternoon rains. Weekends are sociable and busy with capital escapees; weekdays return the plazas to locals.

Honest expectations

The center is compact but ringed by heavy traffic and unlovely sprawl - the charm lives in courtyards, not avenues. The Cortes palace has had long restoration closures; check status. Weekend hotel rates climb with the temperature in the capital.

Nearby

Tepoztlan's crag, the Las Estacas spring river and Xochicalco's ruins are each within 45 minutes.