Granada had always been the richer of the two towns and its agricultural yield
proved it; however, Leon's location near the Pacific coast better suited the
shipping desires of the Spanish empire at the time of Nicaragua's colonial
infancy and thus Leon was named capital back then. After many years of intense
rivalry between the apparent Liberalism of Granada and the conservatism of
Leon, a new capital for Nicaragua was designated: Managua, almost at a
middlepoint between the two towns.
Still the liberal versus conservative battle exists on a few levels, although
both towns have much in common.
I first visited Granada, and was delighted to find out that it was not some
shopping-mall-in-progress like Managua, but a quaint and relatively clean
colonial town with plenty of fine streets and walkways, some fine churches and
museums and friendly people - and plenty of tourists. All sorts: the
backpackers, the newlyweds, the middle-aged adventurers, they all flock to
Granada. Plenty of younger folks with no interest of moving on either, as I
discovered in a backpacker's dive. Indeed, Granada would seem to be Nicaragua's
major tourist town; which, relatively speaking, is still quite small and
rustic. Still, it's a small place and unless one has an interest in taking
boats into the lake of Nicaragua upon the shores of which Granada sits, a few
days will suffice. The town also reminded me a great deal of Merida in its
colonial setup, its fine church near the ever-present latin parque centrale,
and plenty of decent middle-priced or cheap restaurants. Granada is the
epicentre of Nicaraguan tourism, and is poised to turn into yet another one of those
places which are quite familiar throughout the region filled with backpacker's
accomodation, restaurants catering to travellers, and plenty of advertisements
for activities to keep the dollars flowing out of foreigner's pockets and into
the local's pockets. One night was enough for me, and in the morning I headed
back to Managua, took a taxi across town to the minibuses heading the other
way, and ended up in Leon.
Leon
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