Valparaíso Tagesausflug — Chiles Bohemische Hafenstadt
Valparaíso (the 'Pearl of the Pacific' — the port city 115 km (71 miles) west of Santiago on the Pacific coast of Chile, the city that is the UNESCO World Heritage Site and the most bohemian and most artistically vibrant city in South America) is the most popular and most rewarding day trip from Santiago — a city of painted hills, street art, funiculars, and seafood that is unlike any other city in the world.
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Valparaíso — The Port City on 42 Hills (UNESCO)
Valparaíso (120km west of Santiago, 1.5 hours by bus from Alameda terminal, UNESCO World Heritage historic quarter, Chile's principal port since the 16th century) is built on 42 cerros (hills) connected to the port plan (the flat commercial centre) by 30 ascensores (funicular elevators, 1883–1916) — the city's identity is defined by the layered residential hillsides (each cerro with its own character: Cerro Alegre/the tourist cerro, Cerro Concepción/the Victorian architecture cerro, Cerro Bellavista/the street art cerro) and the ocean views from every elevated street.
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Cerro Alegre and the Victor Hugo Elevator
Cerro Alegre (the hill immediately above the Valparaíso port plan, the most photographed cerro in the city) is reached by the Ascensor El Peral (1902, the most elegant of the 30 funiculars, €0.30) from Tribunal Square — the cerro's streets (Calle Templeman, the primary restaurant and hotel street, lined with Victorian and Art Nouveau mansions from the English, German, and French merchant communities who dominated Valparaíso commerce 1850–1910) and the viewpoints (Paseo Gervasoni, Paseo Yugoslavo) are the primary tourist experience; the Museo Municipal de Bellas Artes (Palacio Baburizza, free Sunday) is on the paseo.
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Pablo Neruda's La Sebastiana — The Poet's Valparaíso House
La Sebastiana (Ferrari 692, Cerro Florida, Valparaíso, Tuesday–Sunday 10am–6pm, $6) is the most visited of Pablo Neruda's three houses (the others being La Chascona in Santiago and Isla Negra on the coast) — Neruda (1904–1973, Nobel Prize Literature 1971, Chile's most celebrated poet) designed La Sebastiana (completed 1961) as a 5-storey tower with a studio at the top where he could see both the ocean and the city; the revolving bar (the prized possession of the house, designed for Neruda by a ship's carpenter), the glass horse-head ornament, and the sea-facing windows are the memorable elements.
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Cerro Bellavista — Chile's Street Art Capital
Cerro Bellavista (accessible from the port plan by the Ascensor Espíritu Santo) is the most concentrated street art district in Chile — the MuRo project (Museo a Cielo Abierto, Open Air Museum, 2009) placed 20 large-format murals on the hillside walls by Chilean and international artists, beginning a process of organic expansion that has covered most of the cerro's visible surfaces; the quality of the work ranges from museum-quality commissioned murals (by Inti, the most internationally known Chilean street artist) to informal community decoration; the cerro's street art circuit takes 2 hours.
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Valparaíso's British Cemetery — The Imperial Merchants of the Pacific
The British Cemetery of Valparaíso (Cementerio de Disidentes, Almirante Riveros, Cerro Panteón) is the resting place of the English, German, and American merchant community that made Valparaíso the most important Pacific port in the Americas 1820–1914 — the graves (Victorian-era marble with bilingual inscriptions) document the nationalities of the commercial elite; Lord Thomas Cochrane (the Scottish naval officer who created the Chilean Navy, 1819–1822) has a monument here though his body is in Westminster Abbey; the cemetery is freely accessible and maps are available from the entrance watchman.
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Viña del Mar — Chile's Garden City and Casino
Viña del Mar (the city immediately north of Valparaíso, accessible by the Metrotrén Valparaíso-Viña del Mar, 25 minutes) is Chile's premier beach resort — the Casino de Viña del Mar (1930, the oldest casino in South America still in operation, free entry but strict dress code), the Avenida Perú beachfront (4km of north-facing beach, the warmest stretch of the Chilean coast near Santiago), and the Festival de la Canción (the Chilean version of the Eurovision Song Contest, held annually since 1960 in the Quinta Vergara amphitheatre) make Viña del Mar the primary Santiago day trip.