Estelí

About this place

Estelí is a city in the northern highlands of Nicaragua on the Pan-American Highway, 150 km north of Managua. With about 111,000 people it is the de facto capital of the north, nicknamed the «Diamond of the Segovias», and lies about 55 km in a straight line from Somoto Canyon. The first settlement on the site was founded in 1685 by Spaniards fleeing pirate raids on Nueva Segovia, and the city grew from a later settlement called San Antonio de Pavia. In 1858 it was described as a little town on a small plain crossed by a river of the same name. Its climate suits tobacco, so after 1959 it became a refuge for Cuban cigar makers, and it is now one of the world's most important cigar-making cities. The city sits at about 844 metres, so the climate is mild most of the year, ringed by mountains of pine and oak forest and plateaus up to 1,600 metres. Green tobacco fields spread around it, and in its workshops cigars are rolled by hand. From the Tisey-Estanzuela reserve you look down over the city and valley. Nature reserves around the city include Miraflor and Tisey-Estanzuela. Ask locally about visiting cigar workshops, and respect photography rules inside.