Yesterday afternoon I spent four hours in a walking tour of Bogotá churches and 95% of the time we spoke Spanish. Woo hoo! It helped that Alejandro, my tour guide, has another life as a professor of English at a government-funded technical school and could gently correct my mistakes. But I think that carrying on a conversation for that many hours is an accomplishment of which I can be justly proud.

Today I made the same arrangement with my guide, Nataly, who met me with driver, Carlos, who drove us to Zipaquirá Salt Cathedral, about an hour away.

She told me the reason for the lack of traffic yesterday (and not being able to use Uber) was that every 4 months or so, private cars and motorcycles are not allowed in the city, only commercial cars such as taxis—a day of respite from the traffic in a city rated #1 worst in South America and #6 worst in the world.

Today we were back in bumper-to-bumper traffic nearly halfway to Zipaquirá, a Roman Catholic cathedral built within the tunnels of a salt mine 660 feet underground. Here’s a story I found on the internet which describes this architectural wonder: “Colombia’s Salt Cathedral is a Marvel of Architecture and a House of Worship“

Initially, miners prayed in a small sanctuary built inside the caverns. There, they would pray to the Virgin of the Rosary of Guasá, the patron saint of miners, to protect them from toxic gases, explosions and other accidents. That first sanctuary was built in the 1930s.

“The work was very dangerous,” Juan Pablo García, a cathedral administrator, said of mining the Zipaquirá salt deposits, where commercial mining began in 1815. “Every day that they came out of the mine alive was a reason for giving thanks.”

After extracting salt, the miners left in their wake a vast network of grottoes, pits and passageways. Retired mining engineer Jorge Castelblanco says most exhausted mines are simply abandoned and sealed up. But Zipaquirá’s miners and church officials — influential figures in this deeply Catholic country — persuaded the Colombian government to convert the empty spaces into a church in 1953.

Structural problems forced its closure in 1990. That’s when Castelblanco, 127 miners, plus a handful of sculptors were brought in to build the current version of the cathedral — located 200 feet below the original cathedral. (The first sanctuary from the 1930s had been closed earlier because it was unstable).

It was a massive undertaking. Just carving the Stations of the Cross into the walls took five years. Another challenge was transferring the massive rock salt altar from the old site to the new.

“It weighed 16 tons,” Castelblanco said. Workers had to cut it into three pieces to make the move.

Their efforts appear to have paid off.

“It’s magnificent,” said Ana Milena Arroyo, a Catholic pilgrim from northern Colombia, after exiting the cathedral following Mass on Palm Sunday. “It’s amazing that people had the genius to build this.”

There were plenty of visitors and tour groups that were visiting today, but I was glad I had Nataly as a private guide. We entered the massive complex through a tunnel lit by colored lights.

The first places we visited were the 14 chapels representing the stations of the cross, which illustrate key events on Jesus’ path to his crucifixion, with the ceilings, walls and floors all carved out of salt, which is naturally black in color.

Finally, we saw the main nave which had constantly changing colored lights, video and music. I took a very short video to show what we were seeing in the cathedral. By the way, I didn’t see any musical instruments of any kind anywhere in the cathedral—some websites speak of hearing a choir sing, but I must admit the acoustics are very reverberant inside. A cappella music would sound heavenly!

There was a number of art exhibits which were made by indigenous artists—I was quite taken by these images.

Finally, we took a train to get above ground!

We ended the tour with lunch at a local restaurant where many visitors come, and where the staff puts the flags of the home countries of the locals and visitors. We had the traditional Colombian dish, ajiaco, (thick chicken and potato soup) plus a complete meal of grilled chicken, rice, potato, and salad.

Tonight I join my Gate 1 tour group with a welcome dinner.