Cerro Santa Lucia

Next to the National Library, there is Santa Lucía Hill, a small hill downtown Santiago, Chile. It borders on Alameda del Libertador Bernardo O'Higgins in the south, Santa Lucía Street in the west and Victoria Subercaseaux. Santa Lucia Hill has an altitude of 629 m and a height of 69 m. It has a surface of 65.300m².
Adorned previously with ornate facades, stairways, and fountains, today an adjacent metro station is named for it. Atop the hill, there is a vista point unsurpassed inside Santiago except by Cerro San Cristobal.
It was originally called Huelén by the pre-colonization inhabitants; in mapudungún (the language that mapuches indigenous speaks) the word means "pain, melancholy or sadness". However, the name comes from the day in which Pedro de Valdivia conquered the hill, on December 13, 1541. That day celebrates 'Santa Lucía' Its first use by its conquerors was as a point of reconnaissance, or a lookout in the years of the Conquest (1541).
A few years ago, Santa Lucía hill received an improvement in its illumination system and protections. Also, the Fort Hidalgo was restored and reopened to the public. Traditionally, a cannon is shot at, exactly, 12:00. However, it caused problems with noise pollution, as results the decibels, produced by the shoot, were reduced in order to avoid the noise pollution.
Located in Santa Lucía Hill there is a monument which consists of a 2 mts height stone carved with a paragraph extracted from the text that Pedro de Valdivia sent to the Emperor Carlos V describing the features of the new land conquered.
Surrounding the Santa Lucía Hill, you can head to one of the most important parks in Santiago, but first, we can start our rout heading to the National Museum of Fine Arts, which is in the middle of Parque Forestal.
National Museum of Fine ArtsTapestries, sculptures, engravings and drawings make up part of its collection of 3,000 artworks, organized by subjects and by "ages". It is noteworthy for its exhibits of Chilean paintings. Temporary exhibitions are also organized.
This fine arts museum, housed in a turn-of-the-century copy of Paris' Petit Palais, evokes the city's aspirations to lift itself out of the cultural wilderness. It occupies an entire block in the Parque Forestal area, the city's most 'European' neighborhood, which is rapidly becoming Santiago's main red-light district. Nevertheless, the country's best collection of painting and sculpture is on display is this elegant museum which regularly hosts exhibitions by contemporary artists from Chile and abroad.