After checking in, we grabbed a quick coffee in the Sheraton lounge before meeting the driver we had arranged to take us on a day-long trip around the highlights of Bogotá. He showed up on time, wearing a suit, and the car was clean despite not having functional seatbelts. His English was excellent, however, which added to how much we got out of the tour. The first stop was the nearly one hour drive north of Bogotá to see the town of Zipaquira and the salt cathedral that was built there.
Zipaquira is a functioning salt mine, and the miners had built this cathedral underground as a place to pray for their safety and such. There were some quite obtuse “stations of the cross” at the beginning, and the actual cathedral further in. We had paid for the mine entrance plus the “Miners Route” tour. One word of advice – skip the miners route. All it is is fumbling around in the dark and pretending you’re a miner – pretty lame and a waste of 30 minutes. The cathedral was awesome to see, however.
