Heading down to Ecuador, we made a short stop in Ipiales, just before the border with Ecuador. We arrived in the early morning just when the sun was going up and took a taxi to the only attraction in the town: Santuario de las Lajas, a 100 years old cathedral spectacularly built on a bridge over the Guaitara river.

We reached the church at about 7 am and the service was already going on with lots of people of all ages praying together. Besides the genuine beauty of the place, it made me smile to see quite the same ambiance as on a Sunday morning in a small mountain village in Romania. It felt like home for a moment.