Having both lived most of our lives in Sydney, we are all too aware of the rivalry that has existed between Sydney and Melbourne, Australia’s two largest cities. The residents of each regularly engage in a game of one-upmanship and argue over who has the best weather, coffee, beaches, restaurants or football code.
It is not until you come to a country like Nicaragua when you realise what city rivalry really is (or at least was).
Some say that the Sydney-Melbourne rivalry started in the 1850’s when the Melbourne gold rush elevated it to Australia’s largest city, overtaking Sydney. In that same decade in post-colonial Nicaragua, León and Granada were embroiled in bitter and deadly civil wars. Granada was an important trading port with its lake and river access to the Caribbean and León was the main political centre of the time. Each city’s different political ideals fuelled their desire for control of the nation.
This rivalry culminated in the mid 1850’s when William Walker, on behalf of the Leonese, conquered Granada and left a year later having torched it to the ground, leaving a sign “Here was Granada”. Thankfully nothing even close to this eventuated in Australia.
Just as Sydney and Melbourne compromised by locating its capital city between the two in Canberra, León and Granada moved their capital to Managua to help settle the dispute.
Our visit to Nicaragua included stays in both cities. Granada takes the prestigious tourism title with its beautifully restored and preserved colonial buildings, cobble laneways and a flourishing restaurant scene. The peacefulness only interrupted by the flow of hawkers and buskers offering hammocks, horse and carriage rides or musical interludes at your table. León, on the other hand, is a larger and more authentic city heaving with the people working there. The atmosphere is livelier and the restaurants and bars fill with locals, not tourists.
In Nicaragua, we reached our 30,000 kilometre milestone. At this stage of our trip, our attention is turning to the state of our gear. Very little of what we have is still in good condition, making us wonder if it will last the 20,000 kilometres we have yet to ride. The luggage zippers are breaking, devices are malfunctioning and waterproof liners are no longer keeping us dry, to name a few examples. We’ve become adept at botch repairs using silicon, super-glue, cable ties and duct tape. We hope to get by until the United States where we can easily replace some of these things.
Our bikes are generally in good condition, except for the much needed replacement of air filters and brake parts. Since Colombia we have been searching for these parts and have been always told they would be available in the next country. Nicaragua was our fourth strike, so we committed to the logistical hassles of importing the parts ourselves. At time of writing, they are still on order. At least the Andes here are not so high and we don’t need to use our brakes so much!
Full photo gallery for Nicaragua is online here.
Our Odyssey Overland 
Good to see you two are holding up better than your boots! How many klms do you do a week? Photos look great.
Hi Fiona – is that recently? Or over the whole trip? We do about 550km a week on average, but the last week was zero. We are really loving Antigua, Guatemala.