The waiting room to heaven is Nelson’s bar in Tijuana

Author

By Chad Deal

Publish Date

Jan. 22, 2014

Nelson’s the kind of place sketchy liaisons might rendezvous at midnight.

Place

Bar Nelson

721 Revolución, Zona Centro, Tijuana, BC

Hotel Nelson premiered in 1948 as an extravagant south-of-the-border vacation destination boasting telephones in every room and the first elevator in northwest Mexico. Thanks to its central location and (at the time) luxurious accommodations, the hotel went on to host a litany of famous artists, politicians, and celebrities — Marilyn Monroe among them. Back then, Bar Nelson occupied a small corner of the downstairs lounge, which expanded and remodeled in the ‘60s and has seen few alterations since.

Today, you can follow the Googie-font sign beneath the Arch into the tobacco-stained time warp that is Bar Nelson. Unlike many downtown drinking holes, this retro dive is a surefire spot for otherwise dull early weekdays. If you’re lucky, you may have a cordial afternoon chat with an off-duty Mexican migrations officer or pass an evening drinking in silence next to stoic mariachis who study the labels on their beers as Phil Collins croons from the jukebox. On weekends, you may overhear fanatical debates between art students who just came from a free film screening at CECUT or find company among the sullen deportees, drunk construction workers, and disgruntled elementary-school teachers who shout like 18th-century poets at nobody in particular.

Indeed, it’s the kind of place where sketchy liaisons might rendezvous at midnight — an aura that likely led to the bar being featured in 2009 narco-assassin film La Linea (though you’ll have to stray a few blocks up to Zona Norte to find the magnificently breasted women depicted in the short scene).