Cities usually aren’t always our favourite place, busy, crowded, the same stores and always more expensive. So the plan was to go to León and stay two days and move on, but we were in for a pleasant surprise and ended up staying for five days.
León is a city we came and fell in love with, with fantastic crumbling Spanish colonial buildings providing the backdrop for a city which is as politically intriguing as it is cultural and intellectual. There’s a plethora of places to eat and not a McDonalds in sight. As it is a student city there is something going on every night of the week. It’s also incredibly cheap, which is ideal for us, and surprisingly it’s not too touristy giving a real insight into the Nicaraguan psyche.
Things to do in León
Cathedral and Churches
As with all Spanish colonial cities the biggest and most spectacular architectures are the dominating churches. No visit is complete without a quick tour of the city to see the grand crumbling facades.
The central plaza is dominated by the cathedral, the best bit about this is taking the stairs to the roof where you are instructed to remove your shoes and then with little regard for safety you can wander and climb over the white domes on the roof.
With fantastic views of the city in all directions you can see the volcanoes in the horizon that surround the city. It’s well worth the $1 dollar fee.
Museo de la Revolucion (Museum of the Revolution)
Directly in front of the cathedral across the plaza is the museum of the revolution. For a small fee of $2 dollars you get a guided tour in Spanish of the museum. It’s a good job we took some Spanish lessons as this place is no ordinary museum, it’s really just a room with photographs depicting the history running up to Sandinista revolution of 1979. We were welcomed to the museum by a man who looked similar to Che Guevera and guided around by a Nicaraguan who appears in the actual photographs on display, what really makes this place special is that its ran by the actual revolutionaries of the time. As our guide says he is living history.
And there’s also a great photo opportunity with a rocket launcher, the guide at this point was giving the two finger salute and shouting “Via La Revolution”.
The mural below is at the back of the museum and show the revolutionaries on the left, most notably Augusto Sandio (a huge national hero) and Che Guvera in the centre. Other people on display included the now dead Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.
The tour continued around the building which ironically is the old palace of the Somza government and ended with a walk on the roof for good views of the plaza and surrounding city.
Museo de Tradiciones y Leyendas (Museum of Legend and Traditions)
You will either love or hate this place, we happened to love its quirky, confused and at times ridiculous displays of legends of Nicaragua.
The museum starts with a tank that was used in the revolution. The museum itself is an old prison which explains the murals on the walls and the small display of photographs at the beginning. But that’s about as serious as it gets.
The next room is filled with a rather strange paper mache figure of the now deceased creator of the museum with some of her possessions including her wheel chair and telephone.
There is room after room of paper mache figures and in each the guide tells us the story behind each one. The guide, although very nice, speaks very fast English and sounds like he was taught by a cross between Stephen Hawking and R2D2 making it a little difficult to catch the story behind each one.
I’m not quite sure what this rather creepy woman (below) is doing or her story but it looks like she’s from the film ‘The Ring’, most the figures look scary and I would not want to spend a night in any of these rooms.
Some stories we remember are this “El Duende” which steals children and makes them disappear… (I’m sure I have seen him before in England at the garden centre)
And this woman, who the guide pauses for and says ‘Big tits woman’. We are then informed that local men in the village are attracted to her ‘big tits’ and when they suck the tit they are killed.
There is literally hundreds of these figures, I can’t decide if it’s good or bad. In a way it’s rather ridiculous and we did well not to start laughing but in others it’s incredibly interesting and rewarding. Either way we enjoyed it.
Museo de Arte Fundación Ortiz-Guardián
This fine collection of Central American art is well worth a look and probably one of the best in Central America. This would not look out of place in any European city and we appeared to be the only one there.
House of Ruben Dario
Rubian Dario is revered in Nicaragua as a national hero in the same way we in England idolise Shakespeare. Along with Sandino he appears everywhere. They appear at the airport as a huge painting, as statues in the streets and plazas and not surprisingly as paper maches figures in the museum of legends and traditions. His home which is now a museum contains some of his possessions including, letters, poems, his bed and most interestingly a rather worn gargoyle from the Houses of Parliament. Needless to say our visit here was swift and we made a speedy exit.
Market
We hit the market in search of Iguanas to eat, although we never found any cooked for us to take away we did find a stall selling them.
And swiftly decided that the idea of preparing lizard to eat ourselves was a bad idea.
Night Life
There is loads of bars and restaurants to eat and drink at and it’s really, really cheap. We had a night out with food, live Latino music and plenty to drink for under £10. And £2 was charged for a replacement cocktail glass after I knocked it over! We spent a few nights out and even hit the night clubs although these are more expensive as they charge an entrance fee. A lesson learnt learnt is don’t try to get in in shorts, it may be 35C but you will get turned away!
Volcano Boarding
Many people come to Leon with the sole purpose of throwing themselves down a volcano on a wooden board.
Leon is a fantastic place to visit and a great introduction to Nicaraguan culture and lifestyle.
