Cementerio General de Santiago

Cementerio General de Santiago is a large cemetery in Santiago, Chile's capital, that is home to many of the country's most prominent political and social personalities.

Cementerio General de Santiago, founded in 1821 after Chile's independence, is a maze of exquisite tombs and roads that is nearly a city inside a city. It covers 85 hectares and was created as a beautiful environment as well as a useful location. It presently boasts almost 2 million graves and is home to 172 of Chile's most renowned and prominent personalities, including all but two of the country's presidents.

The larger, more expensive mausoleums for the city's wealthiest people are confined to the cemetery's southern end, whilst the urns and modest graves of Santiago's commoners are situated in the plot's northern reaches.

There is a memorial to the victims of the 1863 Church of the Company Fire, which is still considered the deadliest accidental fire in history. A memorial to the victims of the Pinochet dictatorship was built in 1994, and it carries the names of nearly 1.000 'disappeared' people, as well as 3,000 more who were known to have been slain by the regime.

The cemetery is open daily and is free to visit - remember, families still come here to mourn their loved ones, and it's a sacred space. To completely explore the entire site, it takes several hours. Chile's renowned president Salvador Allende, Victor Jara (an activist and singer-songwriter slain by the Pinochet regime), and Socialist Orlando Letelier are among those buried here.

Location: Prof. Zañartu 951, Recoleta, Santiago, Región Metropolitana, Chile