On the Beatnik trail in Mexico City

Travel

Mexico City was a magnet in the 1950s for some of America's greatest Beat Generation writers — Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and others. Visitors can follow in their footsteps as they follow the Beatnik trail.

A man looks out from a window at the Krikas Bar in Mexico City's Roma neighborhood, Wednesday. During the 1950's this locale used to be the Bounty Bar and upstairs, famed beat writer William Burroughs shot his wife in the head by mistake during a game of William Tell gone awry.

People stroll in a park in Mexico City's Roma neighborhood.

A vintage car is parked on a street in the Roma neighborhood of Mexico City. Their stomping ground was the Roma district, a once-wealthy neighborhood of mansions that was in decline by the time Kerouac and Burroughs lived there. In recent years, Roma has enjoyed a mild rebirth and is now filled with pretty parks, hidden cafes, galleries and upscale restaurants.

Diners enjoy a meal at an outdoor cafe in Mexico City's Roma neighborhood. Fans of America's greatest writers of the Beat Generation can still find traces of their sojourns here in this neighborhood, in cafes and cantinas, along boulevards and even at the site of an infamous killing.

Two women sit on a park bench next to a painted bus at the Luis Cabrera Plaza.

A child walks past a fountain at the Luis Cabrera Plaza in Mexico City. An obligatory stop on any Beat tour is Plaza Luis Cabrera, on Orizaba at Zacatecas Street, an attractive cafe-ringed plaza with trees and a fountain. In the 1950s it was a favorite hangout for Beat writers talking nirvana in a haze of marijuana, heroin and alcohol.

Musicians wait to be hired at the legendary home of Mexico's Mariachis, the Garibaldi Plaza in Mexico City. Mexico City was a magnet in the 1950s for some of America's greatest Beat Generation writers, including Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and others.

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A man looks out from a window at the Krikas Bar in Mexico City's Roma neighborhood, Wednesday. During the 1950's this locale used to be the Bounty Bar and upstairs, famed beat writer William Burroughs shot his wife in the head by mistake during a game of William Tell gone awry.

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