Santiago Travel Guide

Santiago Sightseeing Overview

Santiago is not as famed for its architectural heritage as other Latin American cities such as Mexico City or Buenos Aires. Those visiting Chile for leisure are unlikely to make it a highlight of their trip and most take only a fleeting glimpse before leaving the city to uncover the country's natural wonders.

Nevertheless, Santiago has much to offer travelers eager for cultural diversion and serene oases can be found in even the most fume-choked streets of the downtown area.

Visitors will find a city of lively markets, atmospheric old quarters and shady parks with thriving artistic, social and cultural scenes. The city's museums, albeit small, boast impressive collections, while quality cuisine is accessible to those on even the tightest of budgets. Note that many of the city's museums are free on Sunday.

Santiago is easy to master, as many of the city's main attractions are located in the small downtown area sandwiched between the Rio Mapocho (Mapocho River), Avenida Bernardo O'Higgins (the Alameda) and Cerro Santa Lucía.

Bellavista, just north of the river, is a popular area for its handicraft shops, restaurants and nightlife. It is situated below Cerro San Cristobál, which looms over the city.

Santiago Tourist Information

Servicio Nacional de Turismo - SERNATUR (National Tourism Board)
Avenida Providencia 1550
Tel: (02) 731 8336/7 or 600 737 6288, in Chile only.
Website: www.sernatur.cl
Opening hours: Mon-Fri 0900-1800, Sat 0900-1400.

SERNATUR has another office in the arrivals hall of the airport's international terminal:
Tel: (02) 601 9320.
Opening hours: Daily 0815-2000.

Oficina de Turismo Municipalidad de Santiago (Santiago Tourist Office)
Casa Colorada, Merced 860
Tel: (02) 632 7783.
Website: www.municipalidaddesantiago.cl
Opening hours: Mon-Fri 0900-1800, Sat 1000-1700.

There is another city tourist office on the Terraza Neptuno on Cerro Santa Lucía, and an excellent, more localized office in Providencia (Providencia 2359; tel: (02) 374 2743; http://citi.providencia.cl), open Monday to Friday 0900-2000 and Saturday and Sunday 1000-1900.

Santiago Sightseeing

There are no tourist passes currently available in Santiago.

Santiago Sightseeing

There are no tourist passes currently available in Santiago.

Key Attractions in Santiago, Chile

Plaza de Armas (Arms Square)
Since colonial times, Santiago's focus has been its spacious main square, the Plaza de Armas. Surrounded by grand colonial public buildings, most notably the Metropolitan Cathedral and the ornate Correos Central (central post office), it acts as a haven from Santiago's often oppressive traffic. A central corral of Chilean palm trees shades courting couples, vendors and tourists. Local artists display their latest canvasses and on weekday evenings the square is the scene of a thriving Santiago institution when locals set up trestle tables and pit their wits against each other in fiercely contested chess matches.

Museo Histórico Nacional (National History Museum)
The colonial Palacio de la Real Audiencia houses the absorbing Museo Histórico Nacional, which has a fine series of chronological exhibits on Chile's development from the colonial period through to independence and the modern era, ending abruptly with the military coup in 1973. There is a small exhibit on Chile's indigenous culture.

Plaza de Armas
Tel: (02) 411 7000 or 7010.
Website: www.dibam.cl/historico_nacional
Opening hours: Tues-Sun 1000-1730.
Admission charge.

Palacio de la Moneda (Moneda Palace)
Once the official mint, la Moneda became the presidential residence in 1846. While Chile's head of state no longer lives on site, the building's presidential offices are still used. The bombing of Moneda Palace by air force jets during General Augusto Pinochet's coup against Salvador Allende's Marxist government in 1973 remains an enduring image of the 20th century. Allende took his own life in this building with a gun given to him, according to local legend, by Fidel Castro. Visitors can stroll along the courtyard that runs through the middle of the building, and can arrange to visit the interior with an advance booking (see below).

On the south side of the Moneda Palace, on (or rather under) Plaza de la Ciudadanía, is the modern Centro Cultural Palacio de la Moneda, which has a series of exhibition spaces and some first-rate exhibitions. There is also an excellent shop selling traditional Chilean handicrafts.

Avenida Bernardo O'Higgins (Alameda), Calle Morandé and Calle Teatinos
Tel: (02) 690 4236.
Website: www.gobiernodechile.cl
Opening hours: Tours need to be arranged in advance.
Free admission.

Centro Cultural Palacio de la Moneda
Plaza de la Ciudadanía 26
Tel: (02) 355 6500 or 6554.
Website: www.ccplm.cl
Opening hours: Tues-Sun 0900-2100 (Centro Cultural); Tues-Sun 1000-1930 (exhibitions).
Admission charge for main exhibitions.

Casa Colorada (Colored House)
This 18th-century colonial mansion just off the Plaza de Armas is an attraction in itself, with its elegant facade and rose-colored walls. It also houses the Museo de Santiago (Santiago Museum), which has amateurish but informative displays on the city's history from pre-Columbian times to the development of today's modern sprawl.

Calle Merced 680
Tel: (02) 633 0723.
Opening hours: Tues-Fri 1000-1800, Sat 1000-1700, Sun 1100-1400.
Admission charge.

Museo Casa La Chascona (La Chascona House Museum)
Nobel-Prize-winning poet Pablo Neruda's Santiago pied-à-terre is situated in the lively Bellavista neighborhood. A series of small buildings, rather than a single house, La Chascona has been meticulously restored since it was vandalised by supporters of General Pinochet and now houses a collection of Neruda's possessions. Visitors are taken on a guided tour (Spanish or English) through the house, where the history behind the furniture and possessions is explained.

Fernando Márquez de la Plata 0192
Tel: (02) 777 8741.
Website: www.fundacionneruda.org
Opening hours: Tues-Sun 1000-1800.
Admission charge.

Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino (Chilean Museum of Pre-Columbian Art)
If you only have time to visit one museum in Santiago, make sure this is the one. The Museum of Pre-Colombian Art houses a world-class collection of artifacts from Latin America's pre-Hispanic civilizations. Located in a handsome colonial building, the Palacio de la Real Aduana (Royal Customs House), it exhibits intricately crafted artwork in ceramics, metals, textiles and wood. Tastefully presented and meticulously cared for, the items on show give a unique insight into the lost cultures of the Maya, Aztecs, Incas and other groups which once dominated this vast continent.

Bandera 361
Tel: (02) 688 7348.
Website: www.precolombino.cl
Opening hours: Tues-Sun 1000-1800.
Admission charge.

Palacio de Bellas Artes (Palace of Fine Arts)
This fine arts museum, housed in a turn-of-the-century copy of Paris' Petit Palais, shows the city's aspirations to lift itself out of the cultural wilderness. It occupies an entire block in the Parque Forestal area and has Chile's best collection of painting and sculpture. It regularly hosts exhibitions by contemporary artists from Chile and abroad. Perhaps the most interesting displays are from the early colonial artists charting the growth of the modern nation.

Parque Forestal
Tel: (02) 633 4472 or 0655.
Website: www.dibam.cl/bellas_artes
Opening hours: Tues-Sun 1000-1850.
Admission charge.

Iglesia de San Francisco (Church of St Francis)
Just off Santiago's hectic main thoroughfare, the thick walls of the Iglesia de San Francisco, with the adjacent Franciscan Monastery, provide a peaceful haven from the downtown traffic. The church was originally built in the late 16th century by Chile's conquistador, Pedro de Valdivia, and it has survived regular earthquakes (although its tower has gone through several incarnations). It is one of Santiago's oldest buildings and the adjacent former monastery houses the Museo Colonial San Francisco (Colonial Museum of St Francis), which contains a collection of ecclesiastical art dating from the colonial era.

Avenida Bernardo O'Higgins (Alameda) 834 (entrance to museum at Londres 4)
Tel: (02) 639 8737.
Website: www.museosanfrancisco.cl
Opening hours: Tues-Sat 1000-1300 and 1500-1800, Sun 1000-1400.
Free admission (church); admission charge (museum).

Santiago Parks
Santiago has four large, attractive parks that offer spectacular views of the Andes as well as welcome respite from the city's traffic. All of the following parks are free and are open from dawn to dusk. The landscaped hill, Cerro Santa Lucía, to the east of the downtown area, was where the city was founded by Pedro de Valdivia in 1541. The original settlers were also besieged here by indigenous warriors shortly after the city's founding. Beautifully landscaped (the park was transformed by 19th-century Santiago mayor, Benjamin Vicuña Mackenna), it is popular among courting couples by day. From its summit there are uninterrupted views of the Andes, while the tree-lined avenues around its slopes are perfect for a stroll.

Parque Metropolitano de Santiago contains Cerro San Cristobál - a pine-forested spur of the Andes and Santiago's largest open space. At its summit, a 14m- (46ft-) high white statue of the Virgin Mary dominates the horizon. Pope John Paul II held mass here in 1987 to celebrate his only visit to Chile (much criticized because of the Pinochet regime's human rights record). Its forested slopes are crisscrossed by hiking trails, and facilities include a public barbecue area, two outdoor swimming pools and a modest zoo. The most convenient way to reach the summit is by the funicular railway that leaves from the terminal on Calle Pío Nono in the Bellavista area. For superlative views, there is also a cable car (teleférico) that runs from near the top of the funicular to Pedro de Valdivia Norte in Providencia and back. Roads lead up the hill from Pedro de Valdivia Norte, Pío Nono or La Pirámide.

In the 19th and early-20th centuries, Santiago's beautiful people would come to Parque Quinta Normal for a promenade. The area was in decline, but there has been a recent injection of cash and popularity after a Metro station opened in 2004 just next door. The park retains a peaceful Mediterranean feel and is a good place to take a stroll while waiting for a train at the nearby Estación Central. The park also provides the setting for some rather neglected attractions, including four museums, all of which have seen better days. The best of the bunch is the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural (National Museum of Natural History), where an extensive but dusty collection of fossils, flora and fauna, mostly gathered within Chile's borders, is housed in an impressive neoclassical building.

Parque O'Higgins, also a one-time preserve of Santiago's elite, nowadays attracts visitors of more modest means. Within its confines are an amusement park and the Museo del Huaso (currently closed - it is uncertain when or if the museum will reopen). A huaso is a Chilean cowboy, rather like the Argentinean gaucho, and this museum is dedicated to Chile's rural communities.

Cerro Santa Lucía
Calle Subercaseaux

Cerro San Cristobál
Calle Pío Nono or Calle Pedro de Valdivia

Website for funicular and cable car: www.funicular.cl
Funicular operates: Mon 1300-2000, Tues-Sun 1000-2000.

Parque Quinta Normal
Calle Matucana

Museo Nacional de Historia Natural
Tel: (02) 680 4600 or 4615.
Website: www.dibam.cl/historia_natural
Opening hours: Tues-Sat 1000-1730, Sun 1100-1730.
Admission charge; free Sun and holidays.

Parque O'Higgins
Avenida Via Norte Sur

Mercado Central (Central Market)
A wrought-iron structure (shipped out piece by piece from England in the 19th century) is home to Santiago's Central Market, on the south bank of the Rio Mapocho. With a bustling fish market on the outside, it is the restaurants within that have become the real attraction. Some of the central options under the high ceiling are a bit of a tourist trap - but many visitors don't mind paying for the memorable atmosphere.

Calle Puente and Calle San Pablo, near Plaza de Armas
Opening hours: Dawn to late afternoon.

Further Distractions

Museo de la Solidaridad Salvador Allende (Salvador Allende Museum of Solidarity)
This museum, which has changed locations several times in recent years, houses works of art donated by artists from around the world. The collection began in 1971 when a group of artists and thinkers decided to bring together contemporary works of art to show their sympathy with the socialist policies of the Salvador Allende government. During Pinochet's military dictatorship, exiled artists continued the project and the collection now includes donations by artists from over 39 countries such as Joan Miró, Roberto Matta, Antonio Saura and Yoko Ono.

Avenida República 475
Tel: (02) 689 8761.
Website: www.museodelasolidaridad.cl
Opening hours: Tues-Sun 1000-1800.
Admission charge.

Villa Grimaldi Peace Park
Villa Grimaldi, the former headquarters of General Pinochet's notorious secret police force, reopened in 1997 under a new guise as a memorial park to the victims of Chile's military dictatorship. An estimated 5,000 political prisoners were detained and tortured here between the 1973 military coup and 1987 - and 226 of these ‘disappeared'. Current president, Michelle Bachelet, survived an internment here, having been imprisoned along with her mother in January 1975. The park opened in March 1997, marking a crucial step in Chile's reconciliation with its bloody past, and was the first government-sanctioned memorial to Pinochet's victims.

Avenida Arrieta 8401, eastern suburb of Peñaloen
Tel: (02) 292 5229.
Website: www.villagrimaldi.cl
Opening hours: Daily dawn-dusk.
Free admission.

Cementerio General
Until recently, this has been one of Santiago's hidden treasures, but it is now growing in popularity. This is no ordinary burial ground, more a mini-metropolis of extraordinary tombs. Some are extravagant, some are beautiful, almost all are striking in one way or another. It's also of great historical interest - several leading politicians are buried here, including Salvador Allende, and there is a memorial to all those who disappeared during the Pinochet years.

Profesor Alberto Zañartu 951
Tel: (02) 737 9469.
Website: www.cementeriogeneral.cl
Opening hours: Daily 0830-1800.
Free admission.