Observatorio Manuel Foster — Attraction in Recoleta

Wonderful historical observatory from the early years of astrophysics.

We were given a guided tour in English by a very knowledgeable astrophysics student, who walked us through the creation and purpose of the family observatory when it was built in the early 20th century. She guided us through the mechanisms and functionality of the telescope (including letting us try rotating the roof!!!) and explained more about the kind of observations that they managed to capture. We took a brief break to safely stare at the sun (!!!!!!!) through some solar observation telescopes, then got to learn and play with some meterorites, and see some of the incredible astral photography taken with the telescope through the years.

It was a fascinating, extremely enjoyable visit, and our guide had so much knowledge and passion. A massive highlight of our trip to Santiago, and completely...

A delightful experience. Learn about the very first telescope in South America. With this telescope, astronomers determined that Earth is not the center of the universe. So fun and interesting. Your guides speak English and Spanish and are super friendly and knowledgeable. I'd highly recommend!! Take the teleferico up and back to enhance...

For a place that opens once a year, it's not really a big deal. The visit was quite short, but charming nonetheless. Still, taking into account the fact that this is, after all, an old observatory that's over a hundred years old, you can't expect much. A good experience for anyone intrigued by Chilean history and development in...