Morelia is built from cantera rosa, a pink volcanic stone quarried locally, and the colonial authorities required that everything in the centre use it. The result is about 250 listed buildings in one material, UNESCO listed since 1991, with a cathedral whose two towers are among the tallest of any baroque church in the Americas. The city was called Valladolid until 1828, when it was renamed for Jose Maria Morelos, who was born here and who took over the independence movement after Hidalgo was executed.
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It is the capital of Michoacan, a state with a serious security reputation and a genuinely spectacular interior, and the honest position is that those two things are geographically separable in the way set out in the Essential Resources section below. Morelia itself is a university city of about 750,000 with a large student population, a conservatory whose boys' choir is nationally famous, and one of the best Dia de Muertos seasons in Mexico an hour away at Patzcuaro. The monarch butterfly reserves, where hundreds of millions of butterflies overwinter, are two to three hours east.
What Makes Morelia Different to Pack For
Altitude, at 1,920 metres
High enough that the nights are cold all year. Days run 22°C to 28°C with little variation, nights fall to 8°C to 12°C and to around 5°C in December and January. The air is thin and dry and the sun is strong.
A merino wool base layer for women is the item that makes the evenings workable, and it is genuinely necessary at the butterfly reserves, which sit above 3,000 metres and are cold.
The butterfly reserves are a high altitude hike
El Rosario and Sierra Chincua are at 3,000 to 3,300 metres, the walk up is steep at altitude, and the season runs from roughly late November to March. This is not a stroll and people underestimate both the cold and the climb.
The rainy season is an afternoon event
June to September brings heavy late afternoon storms. The rest of the year is dry, and the spring months are hazy with agricultural burning.
The stone is beautiful and hard underfoot
The whole centre is stone paved, uneven, and polished by four centuries of use.
Recommended Tours and Experiences
The Morelia Packing List
Footwear
Comfortable flat shoes with grip for the stone centre, which is uneven and slick when wet.
Waterproof hiking shoes for the monarch reserves, where the path is steep dirt and loose rock at altitude and there is horse traffic churning it up, and for the Patzcuaro lake villages. This is the one item people regret not bringing.
Clothing
Light layers for the day and a genuinely warm layer for every evening. For the butterfly reserves: base layer, fleece, windproof, hat and gloves, because you will be standing still in a cold fir forest at 3,200 metres.
A packable rain jacket from June to September.
Covered shoulders and knees for the cathedral and the many churches. Michoacan is conservative and Morelia is a provincial capital rather than a resort, so plain, modest clothing is both courteous and less conspicuous.
For sun
A wide brim sun hat, high factor sunscreen and sunglasses. At 1,920 metres the UV is strong at any temperature, the plaza is unshaded, and the reserves are higher again.
Practical
Cash in pesos for markets, buses and the reserve entry fees, which are cash only. A refillable bottle; tap water is not drinkable. A torch for the unlit lanes. Binoculars for the butterflies, which cluster high in the trees. And a zipped crossbody for the market and the bus station.
What to Wear at Key Sites
The cathedral and the Plaza de Armas
A baroque cathedral in pink stone, begun in 1660 and finished a century later, with twin towers over sixty metres and a nineteenth century German organ of more than four thousand pipes.
Practically: shoulders and knees. On Saturday evenings the city stages a free fireworks and light show on the cathedral facade, which is the single best hour in Morelia and is entirely free. Take a warm layer, because it happens after dark and the plaza is cold.
The aqueduct and the Calzada Fray Antonio de San Miguel
An eighteenth century aqueduct of 253 arches running into the city, with a tree lined pedestrian avenue beside it leading to the Santuario de Guadalupe, whose interior is covered in moulded pink and gold plasterwork.
Practically: a flat twenty minute walk from the centre, lit at night and busy in the early evening. The Guadalupe interior is the most decorated thing in the city and is worth the walk.
The monarch butterfly reserves
El Rosario and Sierra Chincua in the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve, where the eastern North American monarch population overwinters in oyamel fir forest in numbers that bend the branches.
Practically: go between late November and March, arrive late morning when the sun has warmed them enough to fly, and expect a steep 30 to 60 minute climb at over 3,000 metres. Warm layers, hat, gloves, sun hat, sunscreen, water, grippy shoes. Horses can be hired for the ascent. Guides are mandatory and included. Keep voices down and do not touch anything; the butterflies land on people and the correct response is to stand still. This is a two to three hour drive each way, so a long day or an overnight at Angangueo.
Patzcuaro and the lake
A Purepecha town of white walls and dark timber an hour southwest, on a lake with the island of Janitzio in it, and the centre of the most famous Dia de Muertos observance in Mexico.
Practically: cooler and wetter than Morelia and often in cloud, so take a rain layer. For Dia de Muertos, 1 and 2 November, book months ahead and understand that the candlelit vigils in the island and lakeside cemeteries are family mourning, not a performance: go quietly, ask before photographing anyone, and follow whatever the community asks. Many visitors behave badly here and it is noticed.
The markets and the sweets
The Mercado de Dulces beside the old Jesuit college sells Michoacan's candied fruit, ate de guayaba and cajeta, and the Mercado Independencia is the working food market.
Practically: closed shoes in the food market, which is wet. Michoacan food means carnitas, corundas, uchepos and charanda, the local sugarcane spirit.
Santa Maria de Guido and the viewpoints
Hills above the city with views over the pink roofs and the valley.
Practically: take a taxi rather than walking up, and go in daylight. The Cerro del Punhuato has a walking trail that is popular with locals in the morning and empty otherwise.
What Not to Bring
Leave the assumption that central Mexico is warm at night. Leave light shoes for the butterfly climb.
Leave a camera flash at a Dia de Muertos vigil. Leave any plan to drive Michoacan's rural highways, particularly at night, for the reasons below. Leave valuables visible in a parked car. And leave conspicuous jewellery, which is out of place here.
Essential Resources for Women in Morelia
Emergency numbers in Mexico: 911 is the national emergency number for police, ambulance and fire. 088 reaches the Guardia Nacional. English speaking operators are not reliable here, so have your hotel call where you can.
Tourist police: Morelia operates a Policia Turistica in the historic centre, and the Michoacan Secretaria de Turismo runs a visitor assistance service. 078 is the national tourist assistance line and is staffed in English. At the butterfly reserves the guides and the reserve staff are the responsible authority.
US Embassy: the US Consulate General in Guadalajara, about three and a half hours away, is the nearest full post, with the embassy in Mexico City at mx.usembassy.gov. Enrol in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program at step.state.gov before you travel.
Main hospital or clinic: Hospital Star Medica Morelia and Hospital Memorial are the private hospitals used by visitors and insurers, with 24 hour emergency departments and some English speaking staff, and the Hospital General Dr Miguel Silva is the main public hospital. Morelia is the regional medical centre for Michoacan, so it is the best equipped place in the state. Private care expects payment or an insurance guarantee up front.
Official health authority: the Secretaria de Salud at gob.mx/salud, with COFEPRIS for water and food advisories. At 1,920 metres altitude sickness is unlikely, but the butterfly reserves above 3,000 metres leave people breathless and occasionally unwell, and the dry air dehydrates faster than expected.
US State Department travel advisory for Mexico: current advisory level and detail, issued state by state. Michoacan carries the State Department's do not travel level, its highest, with the advisory listing specific municipalities that are excepted. Morelia is normally among the exceptions, along with the Morelia to Mexico City federal toll road and the butterfly reserve area, but the exception list changes and you must read the current Michoacan section rather than the national summary.
UK FCDO travel advice for Mexico: entry requirements, safety and health guidance, with a state by state breakdown. The FCDO advises against all but essential travel to most of Michoacan while excepting the city of Morelia, the toll road to Mexico City and the monarch reserve corridor. The pattern is the same as the State Department's: the capital and the main toll routes are carved out and the rural state is not. Check the current wording before you travel, because these carve-outs are added and withdrawn.
Official tourism authority: Visit Mexico at visitmexico.com, with the Michoacan state tourism board for the butterfly reserve opening dates and the Patzcuaro Dia de Muertos programme.
Solo women safety assessment: Morelia is considerably more comfortable than Michoacan's reputation suggests, and the whole point of this section is that the reputation belongs to the rural state rather than to the city. The violence behind Michoacan's advisory level is a long running conflict between cartels and self defence groups concentrated in Tierra Caliente, the avocado growing municipalities and the Pacific coast, along with extortion of agricultural producers. It is not directed at visitors and it does not reach the historic centre, the Calzada, the university district or the butterfly corridor. Within the city, a woman alone is unremarkable: this is a student capital with a visible police presence in the centre, busy plazas until late and a genuine cafe and concert culture. Practical crime is ordinary urban crime, and less of it than in Guadalajara or Mexico City: phone and bag snatching around the markets and the bus station, and card skimming at standalone ATMs, so use bank lobby machines in daylight and carry a zipped bag in front of you. Use Uber or Didi, which both operate here, or a sitio taxi from a rank, and never take a ride from someone who approaches you. By day the centre is fine to walk. In the evening stay with the Plaza de Armas, the Calzada, Avenida Madero and the Chuchurumbe and Santiaguito areas where people are out, and take a ride app between neighbourhoods rather than walking the long dark stretches in between; the area around the old bus station and the eastern colonias are not evening walking routes. Street harassment is mild by Mexican urban standards and mostly verbal. The single most important rule for this state is about roads: travel only on the federal toll highways, travel only in daylight, and do not drive rural Michoacan roads at all. Take the toll bus to Mexico City or fly, and reach the butterfly reserves with an organised operator rather than a hire car. Roadblocks by armed groups, both criminal and community, do occur on secondary roads. At the reserves themselves the risks are altitude, cold and a steep loose path rather than anything human.
Reading On
Morelia is four hours from Mexico City by toll road and has its own airport, and it is the most beautiful colonial city in Mexico that almost no foreign visitor reaches. The Mexico travel guide for women is the parent for the country and the Mexico packing list for women covers a trip across it. North in the Bajio, the Guanajuato packing list for women and the Leon packing list for women cover the silver cities, and the Guadalajara packing list for women covers Jalisco. East, the Mexico City travel guide for women and the Mexico City packing list for women cover the capital, with the Puebla packing list for women beyond it. South, the Oaxaca packing list for women, the Palenque packing list for women and the Huatulco packing list for women cover the south. The travel packing guide for women is the parent for all destinations. For why a thin wool layer covers a 26°C afternoon and a 3,200 metre fir forest, 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.
