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Officially founded in 1755 on the site of a shrine containing a tiny ceramic figure of the Virgin, Lujan , some 70km west of Buenos Aires, is now one of the major religious centres in Latin America. The Virgin of Lujan is the patron saint of Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay and the epic basilica erected in her honour in 1887 in Lujan attracts around five million visitors a year. This soaring neo-Gothic edifice is one of the most imposing - though not perhaps one of the most beautiful - churches in Argentina. It's perhaps more interesting, though, as a huge machine dedicated to perpetuating the cult of the virgin, the centrepiece of a town which seems designed as a kind of antechamber to her sanctuary. Lujan also makes much of its almost accidental role in various events in Argentine history . In 1806, Viceroy Sobremonte stopped by when fleeing from the British invasions of that year and left the city's revenues in the building now known as the Casa del Virrey, before carrying on to Cordoba. The money was soon captured by the British, who took it to London, from where the money was never returned. Somewhat fittingly, the two leaders of the invasion, General Beresford and Colonel Pack, were later incarcerated in Lujan's cabildo. Various documents and objects relating to these events are exhibited in the town's other major attraction, the vast Complejo Museografico Enrique Udaondo , a kind of multiplex museum with an important historical section as well as Argentina's largest transport museum. Away from the museums and the basilica, all grouped around the town's central square, Lujan is pretty much like any other provincial town. It has its elegant early twentieth-century town houses and its slightly less elegant modern constructions. The town is actually quite large, with around 90,000 inhabitants, but its identity seems strangely subsumed by the Goliath in its midst. That said, Lujan has a leafy riverside park, plenty of picnic spots and couple of decent campsites though its hotels and restaurants have little of the charm of nearby San Antonio de Areco. A notable exception is the town's highly rated restaurant, L'Eau Vive which, in keeping with its location, is run by nuns. If you want to get a real flavour of Lujan in full religious swing, you should visit at the weekend, when seven or eight Masses are held a day - but, unless you want to take part, try to avoid visiting during the annual pilgrimages, when the town becomes seriously full. The major pilgrimages take place on October 5, when up to a million young people walk here from Buenos Aires; May 8, the day of the Coronation of the Virgin; and December 8 when smaller, informal pilgrimages mark the Day of the Immaculate Conception.
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