Cartago

After trying to figure out hotels and such.... and maybe getting a little stressed out.... my oldest host sister, Mariela and her boyfriend Juan, just throughout the idea to go to Cartago, the next province over, so that we could see some sights before it got dark. I was game!
So these are just some pics of the random trip there.

Cartago used to be the capital, and my sister told me that they are a very proud province... but I kind of find that most of Ticos (Costa Ricans) are prideful no matter where they are from.

This is some old building, I can't remember, but they also told me that it's one of the main history things in Costa Rica, and there aren't many so they told me I had to take pictures!

There were churches on every street, all Catholic churches for the most part. So they are known to be a very religious province too. This church, well it's a Basilica (pictured below when all the lights got turned on outside!), I don't know the difference, but it was so beautiful!!! It's very famous, so it was cool to kinda poke around know it. It was a Sunday night, so we got to see the end of the mass that was going on.

This is a picture of where water from a "Holy Spring" runs into. People come here and wash their babies and children in the water, wash their heads, drink the water, and place a part that needs healing under the water.

There is a story about this Basilica about a girl who went to the stream to fetch water and found a doll and put it in a box. She went back to the stream and found the same doll, and was excited that she had two, so she went to put it in the same box, and found that the doll that was there before wasn't there before. So she put the doll in the box again, but secured it this time. Then she went to the stream again the next day, and yet again found the doll, ran home and the doll was no longer in the box from the night before. SO... she talked to the priest, and the priest didn't really believer her, but did the same thing she did, and realized that it was real. The doll that they kept finding was a stone that took the shape of the Virgin Mary. So the Priest concluded that it was Mary telling them that it was a holy place, and that she wanted to dwell there. So in the back under the Basilica they have a place where you can see water streaming in, and the stone Virgin Mary, which supposedly is in the exact same spot. It is kinda a cool story of how it all got to be, and how close they hold to tradition.