‘On the Road’ Sites, Including a Mexico City Sanborns, Then and Now

Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 09.04.07 | 2:30 PM ET

Fifty years after the publication of “On the Road,” the Los Angeles Times’s Christopher Reynolds observes how a number of places depicted in the book have changed—or not—from Sausalito to New York City. Among the places he includes is Mexico City’s famed blue-tiled Sanborns (pictured).

In the novel, Jack Kerouac writes that Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty “ate beautiful steaks for forty-eight cents in a strange tiled Mexican cafeteria with generations of marimba musicians.”

Writes Reynolds: “Sal never mentions a name for that eatery, but it sounds a lot like Sanborns’ La Casa de los Azulejos, a city landmark (and cafeteria and department store) that dates to the 16th century. Famed for its tile work and murals, the building has included a restaurant since about 1919.”

I stopped by the historic restaurant on a recent visit to Mexico City. The place looked as though I imagined it way back when—though I didn’t see anything on the menu for 48 cents.

Photo by jrsnchzhrs via Flickr, (Creative Commons).