Guanajuato was one of the richest places on earth in the eighteenth century. The Valenciana mine alone produced something like a fifth of the world's silver, and the money built a city of churches, theatres and painted houses in a place with almost no flat ground: a narrow ravine, so the city climbs both walls of it. The streets are called callejones, alleys, and many are staircases. One is 68 centimetres wide at its narrowest.
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The river that ran through the bottom flooded the city repeatedly, so it was diverted and the riverbed became a road. That is why Guanajuato's traffic runs through stone tunnels beneath the plazas: the main arteries are underground, which is why the surface of the historic centre is so unusually quiet. It is also where the Mexican War of Independence effectively started, at the granary on the edge of the centre, in September 1810.
What Makes Guanajuato Different to Pack For
Everything is vertical
There is no such thing as a level walk here. The centre is a ravine floor and the neighbourhoods are stacked up the sides on stepped alleys. A day in Guanajuato is several hundred stairs, and it is the single most physically demanding colonial city in Mexico to walk.
Altitude, at 2,000 metres
High enough to feel it on the stairs and high enough to make the nights cold. Days run 22°C to 28°C most of the year, nights drop to 8°C to 12°C, and winter nights can approach freezing. The air is very dry.
A merino wool base layer for women is the item that makes the evening comfortable here, because the temperature falls the moment the sun leaves the ravine, which happens early given the walls.
The Cervantino is one specific fortnight
The Festival Internacional Cervantino in October is the largest arts festival in Latin America and fills the city completely. Accommodation triples in price and books out months ahead. It is wonderful and it is not a quiet visit.
The tunnels are for cars, mostly
Some have pedestrian walkways, some do not, and they are dim, echoing and full of exhaust. Walking a long tunnel is not the shortcut it looks like on a map.
Recommended Tours and Experiences
The Guanajuato Packing List
Footwear
This is the most important line on the list. Flat shoes with real grip and some ankle support, because the callejones are irregular stone steps, worn smooth, often steep, sometimes wet from washing, and they are what you will be on all day. People turn ankles here constantly.
Waterproof hiking shoes are not overkill for a stay of several days, and they are the right choice for the walk up to the Pipila monument, the Valenciana mine road or the Sierra de Santa Rosa above the city.
Clothing
Layers, with a warm one that you carry every day. The daytime is shirt weather and the evening is jacket weather, every single day of the year, and the transition is fast.
A packable rain jacket for the June to September afternoon storms, which are heavy and turn the stepped alleys into waterfalls for half an hour.
Covered shoulders and knees for the Basilica, the Templo de la Compania and the churches at Valenciana, all of which are working churches. Guanajuato is a university town, so it is young and casual, but it is inland highland Mexico and dresses more conservatively than the coast.
For sun
A wide brim sun hat, high factor sunscreen and lip balm. At 2,000 metres in dry air the sun is fierce even at 24°C, the plazas are unshaded, and the climb to Pipila is fully exposed.
Practical
Cash in pesos, more than you would need in a bigger city, because many small places do not take cards. A refillable bottle; tap water is not drinkable. A daypack rather than a shoulder bag, because you will want both hands on the stairs. Book ahead for October. And a tolerance for hills, which cannot be packed.
What to Wear at Key Sites
The Jardin de la Union and the Teatro Juarez
The small triangular plaza at the heart of the city under clipped laurels, with the Teatro Juarez beside it, a Porfirian theatre with a colonnade of bronze muses on the roof and a Moorish interior.
Practically: flat and central, which is rare here. The band plays some evenings and the callejoneadas, groups of student musicians in period costume who lead a singing crowd through the alleys, set off from around here after dark. Take a warm layer for sitting out.
The callejones and the Callejon del Beso
The alley network, and the famous narrow one where two balconies almost touch, with a story about doomed lovers attached to it.
Practically: the Callejon del Beso is 68 centimetres wide, permanently crowded and takes two minutes; the unnamed alleys around it are the real pleasure. Grippy shoes, and go up in the morning before the heat. Losing your way is part of it and the ravine means you can always descend to find the centre.
El Pipila
The monument to the miner who, the story goes, carried a stone slab on his back as a shield to fire the door of the granary in 1810, on the hillside above the city.
Practically: the funicular goes up from behind the Teatro Juarez, or you climb the callejon, which takes about 20 minutes of steep steps in full sun. The view over the whole painted ravine is the best in the city and is worth timing for sunset, with the funicular down afterwards.
The Alhondiga de Granaditas
The granary where Spanish loyalists barricaded themselves in September 1810 and were killed when the insurgent crowd broke in. The heads of Hidalgo, Allende, Aldama and Jimenez were later hung in cages from its corners for a decade. Now the state museum, with Chavez Morado murals.
Practically: sober, excellent and central. The iron hooks are still on the building.
The Valenciana mine and the Templo de San Cayetano
The mine that funded the city, still partly worked, with a churrigueresque church above it built by the mine owner in gratitude, its interior gilded to the point of excess.
Practically: a short taxi or bus up the hill. Mine tours descend on foot into a shaft, which is narrow, humid and not for anyone uneasy in enclosed spaces; a helmet is provided and closed shoes are required. The church is free and covered shoulders apply.
The Museo de las Momias
The mummy museum, which holds bodies naturally desiccated in the local soil and disinterred from the 1860s when a burial tax went unpaid.
Practically: it is what it sounds like, it is crowded, and it is the city's most visited attraction. Some visitors find it straightforwardly upsetting, which is a reasonable reaction to a room of exhumed people. Skip it without guilt if that is you.
Diego Rivera's birthplace and the Cervantino
Rivera was born here in 1886 in a house on Positos, now a museum with early work. In October the whole city becomes the Cervantino festival venue, with performances in the theatres, the plazas and the alleys.
Practically: the Rivera house is small and quick. For the festival, book accommodation and tickets months out, bring warm evening layers for outdoor shows at 2,000 metres, and expect the callejones to be shoulder to shoulder until very late.
What Not to Bring
Leave heels, sandals with no grip, and a wheeled suitcase, which is a genuine problem on stairs and cobbles; a rucksack is the right bag for this city.
Leave the plan to hire a car and park in the centre, because the streets are one way, tunnelled and barely wide enough. Leave the assumption of warm evenings. And leave an October visit unbooked.
Essential Resources for Women in Guanajuato
Emergency numbers in Mexico: 911 is the national emergency number for police, ambulance and fire. 088 reaches the Guardia Nacional. English speaking operators are less reliable here than in Mexico City, so having the Spanish for your emergency written down is worth doing.
Tourist police: Guanajuato city runs a Policia Turistica in the historic centre, and the state Secretaria de Turismo operates a visitor assistance service. 078 is the national tourist assistance line and is staffed in English.
US Embassy: the US Consulate General in Guadalajara and the consulate in San Miguel de Allende, an hour and a half away, cover this region, with the embassy in Mexico City at mx.usembassy.gov. San Miguel is the nearest US consular presence to Guanajuato city. Enrol in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program at step.state.gov before you travel.
Main hospital or clinic: Hospital Angeles Leon and Star Medica in Leon, 45 minutes away, are the nearest full private hospitals with English speaking staff and international insurance arrangements. In Guanajuato city itself, the Hospital General de Guanajuato handles emergencies and the Clinica Santa Ana is the main private option. For anything serious, Leon is where you will be taken.
Official health authority: the Secretaria de Salud at gob.mx/salud, with COFEPRIS for water and food advisories. Altitude of 2,000 metres is not high enough for altitude sickness in most people but it will shorten your breath on the stairs for the first day or two.
US State Department travel advisory for Mexico: current advisory level and detail, issued state by state. Guanajuato state carries a reconsider travel level, and the advisory identifies the southern part of the state as the concern. Read it directly rather than relying on this page.
UK FCDO travel advice for Mexico: entry requirements, safety and health guidance, with a state by state and region by region breakdown. The geography here matters and is specific: the FCDO advises against all but essential travel to the areas of Guanajuato state that lie south-west of the road 45D, and it names the municipalities it means, among them Celaya, Irapuato, Salamanca, Silao de la Victoria, Romita, Penjamo and San Francisco del Rincon. Guanajuato city sits north-east of that line and is not on that list, and nor are San Miguel de Allende or Dolores Hidalgo. Leon is not on the list either, though several municipalities bordering it are. Check the current wording yourself before you travel, because the line and the level can both move.
Official tourism authority: Visit Mexico at visitmexico.com, with the Guanajuato state tourism board for the Cervantino programme and the mine tour operators.
Solo women safety assessment: Guanajuato city is one of the more comfortable places in Mexico to travel alone, and the state level headlines do not describe it. The violence that put Guanajuato state near the top of Mexico's homicide statistics is a fuel theft and cartel conflict concentrated in the industrial corridor and the municipalities south-west of highway 45D, around Celaya, Irapuato, Salamanca and Silao. Guanajuato city is on the other side of that line, is a university town of about 180,000 with a heavy tourist economy and visible policing in the centre, and does not feel like any of that. Petty theft is the practical concern and it is modest: pickpocketing in the Cervantino crowds, in the market and on the buses, and the occasional bag snatch. Carry a zipped daypack, use bank lobby ATMs in daylight, and use Uber, Didi or a sitio taxi rather than hailing on the street, particularly late. Walking the centre alone in the evening is normal and the callejoneadas are a good thing to join as a solo traveller. The alleys are dark and empty above the centre at night, so stay on the routes with people on them and take a taxi up to a hillside hotel rather than climbing alone after midnight. Street harassment is mild by Mexican urban standards, mostly verbal, and the student population keeps the tone light. The genuinely likely way to get hurt here is a fall: the stone steps are steep, uneven and slick when wet or after washing, the alleys are poorly lit, and the combination of a long descent, thin shoes and a couple of drinks accounts for most visitor injuries in this city. Wear grippy shoes, use the handrails where they exist, and do not descend the steep callejones in the dark if you can go round. The vehicle tunnels are not pedestrian routes; do not walk them alone. If you are driving between towns, drive only in daylight and stay north-east of 45D, which is the single most useful rule for this state. Tap water is not drinkable and the dry air at altitude dehydrates people faster than they notice.
Reading On
Guanajuato is four hours from Mexico City, an hour and a half from San Miguel de Allende, and the best looking city in the country. The Mexico travel guide for women is the parent for the country and the Mexico packing list for women covers a trip across it. West, the Guadalajara packing list for women covers Jalisco and the tequila country. South-east, the Mexico City travel guide for women and the Mexico City packing list for women cover the capital, and the Oaxaca packing list for women continues into the southern highlands, with the Huatulco packing list for women on the Pacific below it. On the Caribbean side, the Campeche packing list for women, the Tulum packing list for women and the Cancun packing list for women cover the Yucatan. The travel packing guide for women is the parent for all destinations. For why a thin wool layer is the right answer to a city that is 26°C at four o'clock and 9°C at ten, the best merino wool base layers for women explains the fibre, and the Roman Trail collection is where the tops themselves live.
If the outer journey is calling you, the inner one usually is too. Explore SoulMap at romantrail.com/blogs/soulmap.
