794-794 Travel Guide

The Quinta Real is an unusual luxury hotel in Zacatecas — built directly inside a 19th-century bullring (Plaza de Toros). The ring of stands is kept as a courtyard ringed by rooms, with the former sandy enclosure at the centre, now the lobby and lounge — a model of industrial-heritage conversion.

The Museo Rafael Coronel is housed in a disused Franciscan convent (Ex-Convento de San Francisco) in Zacatecas, famous for its collection of Mexican folk dance masks — thousands of painted wooden masks covering regional festivals and religious drama roles. It also shows works by the painter Pedro Coronel, while cloisters and a dry-well garden add to the old atmosphere.

Cerro de la Bufa is Zacatecas' landmark hill, where the Spanish first found silver in 1546. The summit holds the Museo Toma de Zacatecas (1914 battle), the equestrian monument to Villa, Angeles and Natera, and the Capilla de la Virgen del Patrocinio. Mexico's first tourist cable car (1979) spans 650 m across the city to reach it.

The Cathedral of Zacatecas, built of rare rose-colored stone, sits in the city's historic center and is a masterpiece of Mexican Baroque and Churrigueresque style. The mining city is a Unesco site.

Mina El Edén is a Zacatecas silver mine worked from the 16th century until flooding and declining ore closed it in 1960, now a museum and guided tour. Visitors ride an internal rail car and walk lit galleries and shafts past exposed rock, timbered supports, veins and pooled water, learning four centuries of silver, gold, lead and zinc mining. A small museum at the entrance shows minerals and tools; on weekend nights part of the mine becomes an underground club — one of Zacatecas' most singular experiences.