Planning a family trip to Mexico? TripNest turns it into its own app: 10 narrated story podcasts about Mexico for the drive, games and a quiz for the kids, an audio phrasebook, and the day-by-day plan and map the whole family shares.
How Mexico City began on an island
Imagine a city of canals, causeways and floating gardens, reached only by boat. That was Tenochtitlan, and its remains lie right under today's busy streets. We follow the clues from a temple wall to a modern metro station.
Pyramids built to catch the sun
The Maya tracked the sun, moon and planets so carefully that they could predict eclipses. At Chichén Itzá, a staircase catches the light in a shape people still gather to see. Find out how a building can work like a calendar.
Secret pools under the jungle
There are almost no rivers on the surface of the Yucatán - the water all runs underground. When a cave roof falls in, a cenote opens like a window into that hidden world. We swim, we listen for swifts, and we meet the blind fish that live in the dark.
A bitter, frothy, very old drink
The first chocolate was not sweet, and nobody ate it - they drank it, poured from cup to cup to build up foam. Cacao beans were so valuable that people used them like money. Bring a spoon of curiosity.
Day of the Dead, explained gently
Once a year, families cook the dishes their grandparents loved best and lay them out with photos, candles and bright orange flowers. It is a warm, noisy, welcoming kind of remembering. We visit a market stall selling sugar skulls with names iced on top.
Mountains that steam and grumble
Mexico sits where huge pieces of the Earth's crust push together, which is why it has so many volcanoes. One of them, Paricutín, grew out of a farmer's cornfield and buried a church up to its towers. We look at how scientists keep watch today.
A journey nobody taught them
Monarch butterflies weigh less than a paperclip, yet they travel thousands of kilometres to reach a few small patches of Mexican forest. The ones that arrive have never been there before. How do they know the way?
Meet the axolotl
The axolotl never quite grows up - it keeps its frilly gills and stays in the water all its life. It can even regrow a lost leg. We paddle the canals of Xochimilco with the people working to keep it wild.
Murals, museums and one famous painter
In Mexico, some of the biggest artworks are not in frames - they are painted straight onto stairwells and public walls, huge enough to read like a comic. Frida Kahlo painted something different: herself, again and again, with monkeys, parrots and flowers. Pick your favourite before the episode ends.
Life along two coasts
Mexico has a Pacific coast on one side and a Caribbean coast on the other, and the wildlife is completely different. We snorkel over coral, count the colours of a parrotfish, and wait on a dark beach for hatchlings to find the sea.
Tenochtitlan / Machu Picchu / Carthage / Petra
A natural pool where a cave roof collapsed / A kind of spicy sauce / A volcano crater full of lava / A woven straw hat
Chocolate / Bananas / Rice / Olives
The Mexico podcast has 10 narrated story episodes for the car or the plane: The City in the Lake, Sky Watchers of the Maya, Down the Cenote, Chocolate Before Chocolate Bars, Marigolds and Memories, Volcano Country, The Butterfly Highway, The Smiling Salamander, Walls That Tell Stories and Reef, Sand and Turtles.
"Gracias", said GRAH-syahs. It's one of the phrases in the Mexico audio phrasebook, recorded so the kids can hear it before they try it.
911 (Emergency (all services)). TripNest puts it in your trip's contacts page next to your own contacts.
Every trip starts free: the day-by-day plan, map and contacts. Premium adds the Mexico podcasts, kids' games and the audio phrasebook for $24, once per trip - no subscription.
No. Your trip is one link that opens on everyone's phone, grandparents included, without an account. You can add it to your home screen so it works offline once you land.