Adjacent to the cathedral, the 1935 palace houses the Museo Nacional . The timeline starts only 500 million years ago, as Nicaragua is one of the newest places on earth, and takes visitors through the formation of the lakes and volcanoes – not to mention gold mines – before getting to pre-Columbian statuary and one of the best pottery collections in the country, all well signed and explained.
Other exhibits whiz through the Spanish-colonial period before landing in the Sandino, then the Sandinista, eras. Above the main staircase is a mural of revolutionary movements in the Americas by Mexican artist Arnold Belkin, and there’s also a room tracing 500 years of art (most from the 1970s). Admission includes a 30-minute guided tour in Spanish.
