SANTA TECLA (Nueva San Salvador)

- Metro San Salvador, city centre, residential areas, volcano

Santa Tecla is a city that borders San Salvador's Antiguo Cuscatlan district to the West, and is situated right at the foot of the San Salvador volcano, Quetzaltepec. It is part of the La Paz department, that borders the San Salvador department, but it is not always obvious where the borders are. In 1854 the city was founded as Nueva San Salvador and was the temporary capital of the country (until 1859), after San Salvador was devastated by an earthquake. In 2003 the city was renamed Santa Tecla. It is somewhat of a suburb to San Salvador but has 134 000 inhabitants of its own, and is one of the largest cities of El Salvador. Santa Tecla was named after Saint Thecla, a saint of the early christian church. It is considered safer then San Salvador itself.

Significant buildings are the Municipal Palace, Santa Tecla Museum, Cathedral del Nuestra Señora del Carmen and José San Martin Park.

We stayed for a week in a house in a residential area in Santa Tecla, mostly as a base for surounding attractions. We only passed through the city centre briefly once, and visited one of the few post offices in the country.