Things to do
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Algarrobo
A resort town on a broad protected bay, home to the country's first yacht club and to a private complex whose artificial lagoon is among the biggest ever built. The public beaches on the bay stay calm, the penguin islet lies just offshore, and the drive up from Isla Negra takes about a quarter of an hour.
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Casa de Isla Negra
The largest of Pablo Neruda's three houses, built up in stages from a stone cottage bought in 1939 and filled with ships' figureheads, coloured bottles, narwhal tusks and a locomotive standing in the grounds. The poet and Matilde Urrutia are buried in the garden above the sea, and the visit runs by timed audio guide that sells out on summer weekends.
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El Quisco
A fishing cove that became a summer town, immediately north of Isla Negra, where the boats still land congrio and the pelicans work the rail of the caleta pier. Its main beach is sheltered by the standards of this coast, and it fills to capacity through January and February.
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Islote Pájaros Niños
A low island a short way off the Algarrobo shore, protected as a nature sanctuary and holding a colony of Humboldt penguins along with pelicans and cormorants. Landing is not permitted, so the birds are watched from the breakwater beside the yacht club, and the colony is fullest between September and March.
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Punta de Tralca
A headland of stacked granite blocks a few kilometres north, where the swell drives into caves and blowholes and a church retreat holds most of the ground above. The rocks are walkable at low water and dangerous once the surf is up, and the ways down from the coast road are unsigned.