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Zipaquirá

Here you’ll find travel reports about Zipaquirá. Discover travel destinations in Colombia of travelers writing a travel blog on FindPenguins.

18 travelers at this place:

  • The Craze for TravellingThe South American Odyssey
    Day146

    Iglesia Zipaquira

    February 22 in Colombia

    Also known as the Diocese Cathedral was inaugurated and consecrated on November 9th, 1870. Its interior paintings were finished in 1916 and it was finally exalted as a Cathedral in 1952, the year the Zipaquira diocese was created.

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  • The Craze for TravellingThe South American Odyssey
    Day146

    End of the salt mine tour

    February 22 in Colombia

    Years before the underground church was built (around 1932), the miners had carved a sanctuary, as a place for their daily prayers asking for protection to the saints before starting to work. In 1950, the construction of a bigger project had begun: the Salt Cathedral which was inaugurated on August 15, 1954 and dedicated to Our Lady of Rosary, Patron saint of miners. It was compound of three naves and a monumental cross. Part of the galleries were actually carved by the ancient Muisca. However, as the church was carved inside an active mine, structural problems and safety concerns led the authorities to shut it in September 1992. The building had 120m length and 22m height. It had six main columns, and a maximum capacity of 8000 people. The main nave included the monumental cross, which was illuminated from the base up, projecting a large cross-shaped shadow in the ceiling.
    In 1991 the construction of a new cathedral was undertaken, 200 feet under the older one. This new Cathedral was inaugurated on December 16, 1995. Its various corridors and sanctuaries were achieved by making small but significant additions to the caves left behind by previous mining operations.
    The tour actually lasted almost 45 min. Our guide left us at the end of the salt mine. There were many souvenir shops there. In fact, I have never seen that many souvenir shops in one place before. There were counters for salt figurines, salt jewelry, salt based bathing soaps, salt based body products etc. There were even emerald counters since Colombia is famous for its emeralds.    Read more

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  • Elvis LivesElvis Lives Tour
    Day563

    Salty Goodness

    November 30, 2017 in Colombia

    I can't remember let alone pronounce the name of this nice little town that is made famous by its stunning salt cathedral.

    You start by walking down a tunnel oozing with salt and are soon 200m below the surface. This used to be an active salt mine, but as techniques progress they start mining the next layer down. They're currently mining level 4 down, using water which creates huge bottle shaped caverns. Previously they used long corridors and they spent 11 years converting this layer into a cathedral.

    There are 14 stations of the cross carved into the long rectangular caverns. Each cross is many metres high so you can imagine (or just look at the photos!) how impressive they are when lit up. Then you hit the main cathedral on a balcony looking out over 3 massive caverns.

    As you delve to the far end there's a super tacky light show and lots of tourist tat, which did make it feel a little less reverent although a lot more Colombian.    Read more

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  • The Craze for TravellingThe South American Odyssey
    Day146

    Parque Principal Zipaquirá

    February 22 in Colombia

    The bus dropped us on the South side of the small town of Zipaquira. From here, the main square of the Parque Principal is about 2 kms and the Underground Salt Cathedral is about 1.5 kms West of the town, just outside the limits of the town. Zipaquira is a beautiful town. The cobbled streets and the wooden balconies and brightly painted facades reminded us of Cusco. The feeling was much more reinforced when we reached the Parque Principal. That place looked exactly like the main square in Cusco. A wide open space with cobbled flooring, beautiful Spanish colonial buildings all around and a lovely church.Read more

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  • The Craze for TravellingThe South American Odyssey
    Day146

    The Salt Cathedral, Zipaquira

    February 22 in Colombia

    From the main square, we walked Westwards to the Salt Cathedral. By the time we reached the entrance, it was almost 12 pm.
    The Salt Cathedral is an underground Roman Catholic church built within the tunnels of a salt mine 200 metres below the ground in a halite (rock salt) mountain near Zipaquira. It is a very popular tourist destination and place of pilgrimage in the country. The temple at the bottom has three sections, representing the birth, life, and death of Jesus. The icons, ornaments and architectural details are hand carved in the halite rock. Some marble sculptures are also there.Read more

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  • The Craze for TravellingThe South American Odyssey
    Day146

    Inside the Salt Mine

    February 22 in Colombia

    We climbed onto the halite hill. The path leading up is through some nicely manicured lawns and the entrance is at the top. The ticket price of 55,000 COP for adult foreigners is extremely steep. Its not cheap for locals as well. One would need an id for entry as a local and still costs 35,000 COP. An honest opinion would be, its not really worth the money, but if one is in Bogota it is definitely worth a visit once. Included in the ticket is a tour guide. There are tours in Spanish and English, but the frequency of the English tours is quite less. We were lucky that the next English tour was at 1 pm. That gave us enough time to eat some quick food as lunch at the expensive restaurants near the entrance of the cave. The tour started promptly at 1 pm and our guide told us not to take pictures while we were with him as he wanted to do the tour in the given 30 min and that after the tour we would have time till 7 pm in the evening to go around wherever we pleased and take as many pictures as we liked. This was a good idea, as we could focus on listening about the history of the cave etc. and later there was no one pushing us to run while we took the pictures.
    Salt deposits in Zipaquira were formed around 250 million years ago, and were raised above sea level during the late Tertiary period, when the Andes were formed.

    The halite mines were exploited already by the pre-Columbian Muisca culture since the 5th century BC. According to records from the 1800s, Zipaquira had deposit bigger than the main halite mines of the time, such as those in Spain, Switzerland, Poland and the County of Tyrol with a calculated resource estimation of one million cubic meters.    Read more

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  • The Craze for TravellingThe South American Odyssey
    Day146

    The rooftop light show

    February 22 in Colombia

    Near the end of the cave, the was a room where there were colorful images being projected on the barrel shaped roof. The chairs were in the shape of lounge chairs pushed back in such a way that one could lie down and look up towards the roof where the various cultural things from Colombia were being projected. The show was for about 15 min. After that we went to the auditorium where a film ‘Guaza’ was being projected in 3D. The movie recreates the history of the salt dome formation and operating methods that lead to the construction of this majestic cathedral of salt, which is entirely man-made.
    From here, we retraced our steps all the way back towards the entrance of the cave.    Read more

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  • The Craze for TravellingThe South American Odyssey
    Day146

    The Stations of the Cross

    February 22 in Colombia

    At the entrance of the church, there are 14 small chapels, representing the stations of the cross, which illustrate the events of Jesus' last journey. Each station has a cross and several kneeling platforms carved into the halite structure.

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  • Mates in South AmericaSouth America
    Day6

    Catedral de Sal

    November 4, 2017 in Colombia

    By now it feels like we didn't sleep at all since we arrived in Bogotá.
    Next stage: Zipaquirá.
    There is a salt mine in the mountain of Zipaquirá. It was big, deep and nice to be in 😉, but.. well, the religious part in it overshadowed the overall impression too much.
    In short: boooooring

    But anyway, we made the best out of it and so far we like it in Colombia (not Columbia - una loca chica corrected me 😐)Read more

    1 comment
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  • Anna Weiß6 weeks Colombia
    Day4

    Zipaquirá

    May 17, 2015 in Colombia

    Around one hour northeast of Bogotá, lies the small, colonial village Zipaquirá, which is famous for its salt cathedral. I went today with Lindsay, a Canadian girl from the hostel.
    Still really tired from the party the night before and not used to the sunday timetable, it took us first of all a while to find a Transmilenio station which was serving.
    The town is really cute and actually we liked it better than the actual attraction, since all around the cathedral there is a huge tourist area, almost looking like a theme-park. Also inside the cathedral, which rather looks like a mine, there were a bunch of people, making it almost impossible to walk normally. Despite this, it is a really cool place to go.Read more

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You might also know this place by the following names:

Zipaquirá, Zipaquira, Сипакира, سیپاگیرا, სიპაკირა, 시파키라, 錫帕基拉

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