I’ve updated my original list for Mexico City on Monday to include some more great places that I found open. Enjoy your Mondays everybody!
Most museums are closed on Mondays so as a tourist it’s a good time to organize an alternative tour (for exploring street food or culture and history) or head out to visit one of Federal District’s more far-flung attractions (think the floating gardens of Xochimilco or Teotihuacán’s massive pyramid).
If you can’t kick the museum craving, MUCHO (the Chocolate Museum – 11am to 5pm) is open Monday to Sunday … and who doesn’t need a little pick-me-up on this first day of the week? Set in a beautifully restored 1909 home in Colonia Juarez, don’t miss the chocolate wallpaper, Willy Wonka- style and the kitschy displays of women grinding cacao on a metate. They also have a small cafe below the museum where you can sample different kinds of chocolate from all over Mexico or buy some to take home with you. It also just happens to be one of my list of six Mexico City museums that won’t make you want to kill yourself. The Secretaria de Educación Pública is also open on Mondays from 10am to 5pm (although they are temporarily closed until 2025 for renovations). Their interiors are completely covered with Diego Riviera murals and as well as a few smaller installations of Siqueiros, all of which are stunning. Museo Estanquillo is a museum of Mexican writer Carlos Monsivais’ vast personal collection of whimsical memorabilia and tchotchkes, I highly recommend it. The Cuicuilco mound ruins are located within the city limits and have a museum on-site dedicated to the civilization believed to have lived there until natural disaster struck. The Museum of Mexican Design is open, and while I have to admit I have never toured the museum, they have an excellent gift shop with awesome gifts to take home, all done by local Mexican designers (and there is a cafe next door for a refresh). AND maybe, my favorite, the Museo del Juguete Antiguo Mexican — a mind-bending hodge-podge of toys from 20th Mexico and the U.S. that was collected by one man over his lifetime. It feels more like a warehouse than a museum, in an old building that was once the founder’s parents’ print shop, but you will be struck by nostalgia and I love it I think. (oh, there’s a souvenir shop).
Almost every day of the week there is a tianguis, or open-air market going on 
somewhere throughout the city. Here’s an amazing interactive map that shows tianguis all over the city for every day of the week for you to take your pick from.
And of course, there are all the city’s indoor markets where Monday is a big day for buying and selling. Check out the Merced for a sensory overload or the smaller Mi Mercados scattered throughout the city.
It can be a quiet day for eating and drinking since many places are either closed or lock up early. Avoid Reforma and the Centro and head out into more neighborhood street scenes such as Alvaro Obregón en La Roma, Tamulipas in La Condesa, Hamburgo and Londres in La Zona Rosa, or Torres Adalid in La Navarte. Or take in a show, there’s lots of local theater for Spanish-speaking audiences.
**Updated in August 2024** For other ideas on how to spend your days in Mexico City see my guide to Colonia Roma, Sunday in Mexico City, and Discovering the Polanco Aviary.
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