A church high up on the mountain is one of the city’s most popular tourist attractions.
Monserrate has been considered an important sacred place since before the arrival of the Spanish: the local Muisca indigenous people called the mountain quijicha caca, or ‘grandmother’s foot’, and considered it important to their religious traditions, due to the fact that the sun rises directly behind the mountain during the solstice in June. This is visible from the modern Plaza Bolivar and is thought to be why the first cathedral of the city was constructed there.
