Things to do
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Barrio Lastarria
A short grid of nineteenth century houses between Cerro Santa Lucía and the Parque Forestal, holding independent bookshops, the Gabriela Mistral cultural centre and a weekend antiques market along the main street. Bellas Artes station sits at the northern end, which makes it the simplest base in the old centre.
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Catedral Metropolitana
Begun in 1748 by Bavarian Jesuit builders and finished under the Italian architect Joaquín Toesca, this is the fifth cathedral raised on the same corner of the Plaza de Armas. Three naves run under a barrel vault to a marble altar, and the doors stay open through the day between Masses.
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Cerro San Cristóbal
A hill rising about three hundred metres above the city inside the Parque Metropolitano, topped by a white statue of the Virgin and reached by a 1925 funicular from Bellavista. The summit terrace gives the clearest view of the cordillera, and the road up closes to cars on Sunday mornings for cyclists.
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Cerro Santa Lucía
A rocky outcrop landscaped into terraces, staircases and stone balconies in the 1870s, standing on the site where Santiago was founded in 1541. The climb to the upper battery takes about fifteen minutes from the Alameda gate, and the park closes in the early evening.
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Gran Torre Costanera
At three hundred metres the tallest building in South America, finished in 2014 above a shopping centre in Providencia. The Sky Costanera deck takes floors sixty one and sixty two and adds an open air level at the top, and entry is by timed slot, so a clear day is worth holding out for.
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La Chascona
The house Pablo Neruda built for Matilde Urrutia on the Bellavista slope in 1953, laid out like a ship in separate blocks climbing the hill and named for her unruly hair. Ransacked after the 1973 coup and restored by the Neruda foundation, it is visited by audio guide and closes on Mondays.
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Mandarin Oriental
A tower in Las Condes set above gardens and one of the largest outdoor pools in the city, twenty minutes from the old centre on Metro Line 1. The upper floors face the cordillera, and the ground floor works as a business hotel with a resort attached to it.
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Mercado Central
A wrought iron hall cast in England and raised over the fish trade in 1872, still selling congrio, reineta and picorocos on ice under its roof. Trading is done by early afternoon, so the morning is the only time the hall reads as a market instead of a dining room.
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Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino
Set in the 1805 Real Aduana building a block off the Plaza de Armas, the collection covers four thousand years of Andean and Mesoamerican work, with a basement gallery given entirely to the cultures of Chile. It closes on Mondays, and the Chinchorro mummies are the part that earns an extra half hour.
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Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos
A copper and glass box beside Quinta Normal park documenting the human rights violations of the 1973 to 1990 dictatorship through testimony, court files, newspaper front pages and the last radio broadcast from La Moneda. Entry is free, most signage is in Spanish, and the audio guide at the desk carries the English.
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Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes
A centenary building of 1910 in the Parque Forestal, iron and glass under a dome shipped from Belgium, holding the national collection of Chilean painting and sculpture from the colonial period onward. The contemporary art museum of the university shares the same roof, and both close on Mondays.
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Palacio de la Moneda
Toesca's neoclassical mint, built in the 1780s to strike colonial coin and the seat of the Chilean presidency since 1846. The wing bombed in September 1973 was rebuilt, the changing of the guard falls on alternate mornings, and the interior courtyards are seen only on a tour requested in advance.
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Plaza de Armas
The square laid out by Pedro de Valdivia in 1541 and still the point from which distances in the country are measured, ringed by the cathedral, the central post office and the old royal court. Chess boards and street portrait painters fill the benches from mid morning, and two Metro lines meet beneath it.
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The Singular
A belle époque styled building on Merced in Lastarria, with dark panelled rooms, a rooftop pool looking over the Parque Forestal and a bar that draws a crowd from outside the hotel. Its sister lodge stands in Puerto Natales, which makes it a practical first and last night in the country.