Experience in Toluca, Mexico by Ale

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What is it like to live in Toluca? Would you recommend it? What is the city like?

Living in Toluca is a pleasent experience if you like tranquility but also having options for having fun. It is true that Toluca is not a big city but it has little town really near by that gives more options to the people for doing different kind of things. I recommend living in Toluca because we have a lot of opportunities and the city is getting more development each year. The city is beautiful, it has it's details of course goods and bads, but they are renovating a lot of parts of the city so it's nice. The weather is temperate, it's windy most of the year, and in the last months of the year (November, December, January) it's cold (min. -3 C max. 17 C).

What is the student lifestyle like in Toluca?

The student lifestyle it's easygoing, there are a lot of different schools in Toluca and now even universities, there are a lot of options for students to reduce costs of living, like cheaper supermarkets, local markets, low rents, etc.

Is it difficult to find accommodation in Toluca? Is there any advice you can give?

I don't think is that difficult, depending if you want to stay close to your school or university, the majority of the big schools have houses to rent near the school but there a lot of places to rent in the whole city and Toluca is not that big so it's no so difficult to find accommodation. You can search in the local newspaper (printed), in the boards of your school, or even online.

What is the food like? What are your favourite dishes?

The food is really good, like all mexican food, we have the typical things like tacos (all kinds of them), tamales, pozole, huaraches, sopes and a lot of different options for eating typical food, but you can find good things to eat and prepare yourself in the supermarket or local markets, they are not that expensive.

What places would you recommend visiting in Toluca?

The volcano Nevado de Toluca (it's cold and you can access only by car but is worth it, you can reach the crater and inside of it there are 2 lagoons), La Catedral (principal church of Toluca), The Cosmovitral (its a botanical garden), Galerias Metepec (mall), local markets (you have to visit one of them, depending on where you are living there's always one in each colony), Los Portales (typical place in Toluca, you can go to walk eat some ice cream, popcorn, elotes and watch the stores), Estadio Nemesio Diez (even if you are not that fan of soccer, going to a match at the stadium it's always a good experience).

Is it good to eat out in Toluca? Can you tell us your favourite spots?

It is very good to eat in Toluca and you can find a lot of options like i said before: from tacos, pozole, tamales, huaraches, sopes, elotes, pansita, etc. You can find some places to eat the whole meal (soup, rice or pasta, meal, and dessert, with tortillas and water) they are called "fondas" and it's very economic and nice. You can also buy food to prepare at supermarket and its not that expensive or if you don't want to taste local food there's always fast food (pizza, hamburgers, etc)

Is the nightlife good in Toluca? Where is good to go?

The nightlife is good, but you can find more places to go out at night in Metepec, it's 20 minutes from Toluca in transport, there you can find bars and even clubs, the clubs are more expensive because of the alcohol and in some places they collect cover for entering. You can find little bars where you can have a drink more economic with some snack. The only problem sometimes is the weather, Toluca is most of the year cold, in the last months of the year people don't want to get cold so there is not a lot of people in the streets. If you want to meet more places for the nightlife you can also go to Mexico City it's only 50 minutes from Toluca and there you can find as many options as you want.

What advice would you give future students heading to Toluca?

To be openminded and ready to do a lot of different things. Even if Toluca doesn't have the history of other cities or architecture, it's position is very good and you can go to other cities because Toluca is in the center of Mexico. So you can find more possibilities to visit close to Toluca.