Jinotega
and Cerro Apante

A lake and a cathedral in Jinotega and a reserve next to the city of Matagalpa. According to INTUR, Lake Apanás, in Jinotega municipality, is Nicaragua’s first artificial lake, surrounded by mountains and forest, and MARENA describes it as a 5,415-hectare wetland listed under the Ramsar Convention, with migratory birds and small-scale fishing. The Cathedral of San Juan Bautista, facing Jinotega’s central park, is a neoclassical church founded in 1752 and mostly rebuilt in the 20th century, declared a historic and cultural heritage of the nation in 1947; INTUR gives two dates for its elevation to cathedral (1983 and 1991). Cerro Apante Nature Reserve, with about 1,989 hectares of cloud forest, has a 4.5 km trail that crosses the Agualcas stream and climbs to a lookout with a cross, overlooking the city; INTUR places it to the south and, in another paragraph, to the north-east of the town centre. All three have unconfirmed status: the lake has no published official access and the only hours available are those of a private farm on its shore, from February 2025; the cathedral is a working church with no published visiting hours, and INTUR publishes no hours or fee for Cerro Apante, or whether a guide is needed