Fiesta de Urkupiña
Traditions · Quillacollo, Bolivie
The festival
The feast of the Virgen de Urkupiña, in Quillacollo near Cochabamba, is one of the greatest pilgrimages of Bolivia — half a million faithful, also from Argentina, Chile and Peru. According to tradition, the Virgin appeared at the end of the seventeenth century at a small riverside at the place called Cota; it was called in Quechua: "Orqopiña", "she is already on the hill".
Three days structure the feast: on August 14, the great entrada folklórica of some sixty fraternidades; on the 15th day of the Assumption, the solemn Mass at the San Ildefonso temple; on August 16, the Día del Calvario — pilgrims earn the cerro of Cota by night and extract stones, the "capital" that the Virgin lends them and which they will have to return to him the following year. The feast closes at the end of August with the Urcupiñita of children and a fair of Alasita.
Good to know
The name "Fiesta de la Integración Nacional" is nicknamed, with about half a million pilgrims according to the town hall.