Bolivia's biggest carnival is held in the small mining town of Oruro, which comes to life once a year when more than 30,000 people dance in procession through the streets. Dancers in fantastically elaborate costumes are accompanied by brass bands and perform in front of Bolivians and the odd foreign visitor to honour the Virgin of el Socavon. (La Virgen Morena).
In 2013 Carnival celebrations President Evo Morales, himself a musician in the carnival in his youth, was part of the inauguration of the newly erected Virgen of Sovacon statue. It stands 45 metres high, seven metres higher than Rio's famous Christ the Redeemer statue and just a bit shorter than New York's Statue of Liberty.