After leaving Ometepe we made my way back to Granada for a night. I was traveling with two Swedish girls, one of whom really wanted to see Leon. I had no desire to see the city really, but I was enjoying hanging out with them, so what the heck. A Peace Corps volunteer I met said that Leon is the hottest inhabited place in the western hemisphere. Which of course begs the question of why you would live there at all.
It lived up to its billing. Stifling, suffocating heat. We spent half a day there, which was plenty. I didn't care for the city but it was interesting to see the difference between it and Granada. They are rival cities from way back in colonial days and each served as capital at some point. Managua is now the capital, with Leon about 1.5 hours to the north and Granada about the same distance to the south.
Leon was much more overtly political than Granada. Nicaragua's history has always been bloody, even before America got involved in the Contra war. There were a few really interesting murals and memorials, like this one, which is a surrealist mural depicting the history of the country from left to right across two walls. On the second wall Augusto Sandino shadow literally looms over recent history. It ends with two children running happily into a bright future. Fascinating.
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