Cartago's most important site, and Costa Rica's most venerated religious shrine, this basilica exudes airy Byzantine grace, with fine stained-glass windows, hand-painted interiors and ornate side chapels featuring carved wood altars. Though the structure has changed many times since 1635, when it was first built, its central relic remains unharmed: La Negrita (the Black Virgin), a small (less than 1m tall), probably indigenous, representation of the Virgin Mary, found on this spot on August 2, 1635.
As the story goes, when the woman who discovered the statuette tried to take it with her, it miraculously reappeared back where she’d found it. Twice. So the townspeople built a shrine around her. In 1824, she was declared Costa Rica’s patron Virgin. She now resides on a gold, jewel-studded platform at the main altar. Each August 2, on the anniversary of the statuette’s miraculous discovery, pilgrims from every corner of the country (and beyond) walk the 22km from San José to the basilica. Many of the penitent complete the last few hundred meters of the pilgrimage on their knees.
