Plaza Grande

The Plaza Grande, officially the Plaza de la Independencia and often just called the zócalo, is the main square of Mérida and the point the whole city grid is counted from. It fills the block between Calles 60 and 62 and Calles 61 and 63 in the centro histórico, and it has been here since the city's founding in 1542, when Francisco de Montejo the Younger laid out the new Spanish town over the Maya city of T'Hó following his father's instructions. Today it is a shady park of benches, paths and trees, with free Wi-Fi, where people from all over the city meet, sit and feed the pigeons.

Almost every important building of colonial and 19th-century Mérida faces it. On the east side, along Calle 60, rises the Cathedral of San Ildefonso, finished in 1598, with the MACAY contemporary art museum next door in the former bishop's palace and the covered Pasaje de la Revolución between them. On the north side, on Calle 61, is the green Palacio de Gobierno of 1892, the seat of the state government, whose Castro Pacheco murals are free to see; it replaced the colonial Casas Reales where the Spanish governors lived. The Palacio Municipal, Mérida's city hall with its arcades and clock tower, closes the west side on Calle 62, and on the south side, on Calle 63, stands the carved stone doorway of the Casa de Montejo, built for the conqueror's family in the 1540s and now a museum.

The square is busiest after dark and on weekends. On Monday evenings the city holds a vaquería under the Palacio Municipal arcades, a tradition begun in the 1990s, where dancers in white huipiles and guayaberas perform the jarana. On Sundays the streets around the plaza close to traffic and the Mercado Domingo sets up from about 9:00 to 21:00, with crafts, clothes, and local food stalls with shaded tables, while brass bands and dance groups play for free. A free walking tour of the centro leaves from the city's information office on Calle 62 every morning. Tourist police patrol the area; street salesmen who offer to guide you often steer visitors to overpriced shops, so it pays to browse on your own.