Nicaragua: Leon Viejo Ruins
The town of Leon was founded by the Spanish conquistadors in 1524 on the beautiful shores of Lake Managua with a stupendous views of Momotombo Volcano (there was a pre-Colombian settlement here already). But the location proved less then idyllic – frequent earthquakes and eruptions with clouds of ash raining on the town made life almost impossible, includes the 1610 earthquake that nearly leveled the it. So the settlers had a referendum and moved Leon 30km to the north to a safer location (which it really wasn’t at all since it was surrounded by even more volcanoes). Over the centuries Old Leon got buried under ash and demolished by earthquakes to almost nothing, until excavations rediscovered the abandoned city in 1967 and revealed the foundations of old colonial buildings, churches, and three monasteries. Some structures were being restored when hurricane Mitch leveled everything to the ground again in 1988. It’s a UNESCO World Heritage site.
