Hermitage of the Virgen de la Peña

Arriving in Mijas, right where the tourist buses were parked, we had the first glimpse of La Ermita de la Virgen de la Peña located on Paseo Compass. The chapel was carved into the rock of a promontory jutting into the side of a hill, back in the sixteenth century, in the place where the Virgin appeared to the shepherds. The friar Diego de Jesus Mercy, tried in 1656, to have the authorities make one chapel that would commemorate that place where the Virgin appeared for the first time. His pleas, however, were ignored, and so he decided to excavate the rock. At the beginning, everyone was mocking him because they thought it would be impossible, but then everyday they kept watching his determination and will, and at one point began to bring him some lunch.