Calle 59 and Parque Centenario

Today I was on my own.  After doing some laundry in the morning, I ventured out this afternoon.  I headed west on Calle 59.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, this street has been spruced up in recent years, I suppose because it is the main thoroughfare heading to the central plaza for those coming from the airport.  There is a lot of grand architecture dating from Mérida's heyday... elegant old homes from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  Many of them now are hotels, schools, even funeral homes rather than private residences.  Others have "se vende" (for sale) signs, waiting for gringos to snatch them up.  Well-to-do "Meridanos" looking to buy a new home tend to move into the modern developments on the north side of the city.  To a large extent it's the ex-pats who are reviving the residential streets of the "centro histórico"

Here are a few pictures from my walk down Calle 59...

 

I suspect that the front portion of this hotel was once a private residence.

This building is now a preparatory school.

This old home is now a funeral home run by the Mexican Social Security system.

This lovely place is abandoned, but the facade has been painted to present a good front to the public traveling down Calle 59.  It is for sale.

At the end of the street is someplace that I had never visited before, Parque Centenario (Centennial Park).  It was built in 1910 in honor of the 100th anniversary of Mexico's independence.  It's a pleasant spot, but certainly not on the "must-see" list of Mérida sights.  The most photogenic portion of the park is the entrance gate.

 

Parque Centenario is the home of Mérida's zoo.  Many of the animals native to Yucatán have been moved to the recently opened Animaya Zoo on the outskirts of the city.  The old zoo is very old fashioned with the animals sadly confined to cages.