Fodor's Expert Review Galería Nacional de Arte

Housed in the 1694 Convento de San Pedro Nolasco and adjoining the Iglesia de la Merced, the bright and airy National Gallery of Art displays some wonderful artifacts, including finely detailed pre-Columbian ceramics and intricate Mayan sculptures from Copán. The museum has a dozen exhibition halls holding lovely examples of religious and colonial art; these serious works contrast nicely with the more comic modern works on the patio. Upstairs you'll find paintings by Pablo Zelaya Sierra and other 20th-century Honduran artists. The building has had many uses through the centuries, including as an army barracks and a cockfighting arena. To our minds, the building's current incarnation is its best so far; though small, this is one of Latin America's top art museums. As a bonus, this is one of the few such facilities in the country to present information in both Spanish and English.