One of the items that appears near the top of every list of things to see and do in Bogota is the Salt Cathedral of Zipaquira. Zipaquira is a highland town 50 KMs north of Bogota, and the salt cathedral is exactly that, a salt cathedral. You might ask why. I don’t know that there’s a good explanation for it, but the following one sounds reasonable to me. Zipaquira’s salt mine was nearing the end of its mining life and the citizens and their leaders decided that a used up salt mine would be an ideal site for an underground cathedral with stations of the cross, since it already had a system of tunnels and chambers to use for the stations and naves and chapels and the like. Could they have known that, in the eyes of Colombians, it would become the country’s number one “wonder”, or that it would become an item on every tourist’s itinerary? (I didn’t make the “wonder” part up). I don’t think anyone could have dreamt that.
A tourist in Bogota is what I am, so today I made my pilgrimmage to Zipaquira’s salt cathedral. There was an “all inclusive” tour available through my hostel, but I didn’t think that would be much fun. I wanted to learn to use the Transmilenio, Bogota’s rapid transit system. So that was my first step.
The Transmilenio is an articulated bus with three wagons that crosses the city on dedicated lanes, sort of like Winnipeg’s rapid transit system is supposed to do eventually, if it ever gets completed. The transitways run down the middle of major roads and have stations every mile or so.
Figuring out how to use the Transmilenio was not hard, despite the fact that I could find no posted maps or directions. I simply asked the friendly Transmilenio officials standing in the station and that was that: a few requests to repeat instructions and some smiles and gestures and I was confidently on my way.
The Transmilenio works very well. It carries a lot of people and it goes fast, taking me to the northern edge of the city of 8 million people in about 30 minutes for a dollar or so.
Once I got to the Portal Norte, I exited the station and there were buses waiting, I just had to find the one to Zipaquira. It was quite easy; there was a man by a bus shouting Zipaquira at me, so I figured that must be the one. The bus filled up quickly and left immediately, the trip cost $2.50. An hour later later I was walking across the town square, looking for the Cathedral de Sal.
I made my way to the edge of town and up a hill to where the tourist buses were heading. I passed through some gates, climbed some stairs and found a ticket line to stand in. A long line. Colombia has people moving systems figured out well, ticket sales organization is less efficient.
I “patiently” waited my turn and had a conversation with a ticket “agent” about the “package” I wanted to buy. Salt cathedral entrance fee, museum visit, video about the salt cathedral, guided tour, those were some of the options and they were all pricey. I didn’t want any package at all, I just wanted a ticket to enter the salt cathedral. The basic entrance fee costs about 60,000 pesos (27$) for a foreigner, a little less if you have a resident card. It’s an outrageous fee for Colombia (where museums are often 6000 pesos or about $2.50) but it didn’t seem a deterrent, the place was full. And it’s fitting in a weird way: an outrageous fee for a slightly outrageous spectacle.
I paid my sixty some thousand pesos, picked up my personal electronic guide gadget and walked into the opening in the ground. It smelt like sulphur and looked like a mine tunnel, which is what it used to be. Then somebody had the bright idea to sculpt crosses in the chambers that were left when the salt was extracted. Some chambers were large, some were small. Some had a big cross hewn in the rock, others had a big cross hewn out of the rock. They all had lights: blue, green, yellow, etc., some had an Ave Maria or other recorded music playing.
For each station, the electronic guide gadget would explain it: the symbolism of the cross construction, the colour and intensity of the lights, the size of the chamber, the cracks in the ground, and all the other random features. I thought they were trying a little too hard, and making far too much of what was basically a pleasant stroll through an old mine with nice lights, music, a few statues, a chapel at the end and far too many people.
I strolled for about an hour and that was more than enough. Then I had a nice lunch in the Zipaquira main square, caught a bus back to Bogota, found my way back on to the Transmilenio and was back at the hostel late afternoon.
The only complication was that I drifted off to sleep on the bus, due to an allergy medication I’m taking, and I woke up with a start when they announced we were back at the Portal Norte, and charged off the bus in a bit of a panic.
For me, the highlight of the day was the travelling, figuring out the Transmilenio and using the buses — it’s pretty mundane stuff, but I found it more interesting and much more inspiring than the tourist trap “wonder” of the sacred salt cathedral.