Cueva del Pirata Quintero

Useful Information

Location:	Quintero, Valparaíso, Chile. (-32.7656755, -71.5340802)
Open:	no restrictions. [2025]
Fee:	free. [2025]
Classification:	Sea Cave
Light:	bring torch
Dimension:
Guided tours:	self guided
Photography:	allowed
Accessibility:	no
Bibliography:
Address:	Cueva del Pirata, Quintero, Tel: +56-.
As far as we know this information was accurate when it was published (see years in brackets), but may have changed since then. Please check rates and details directly with the companies in question if you need more recent info.

History

Description

The Cueva del Pirata is located in the city Quintero, on the northern tip of the peninsula which is called Punta Liles. The site is quite popular, there is a large parking lot, a café, several outlooks and trails to the cave. The cave itself is actually the most dull part of this site, the most spectacular is probably the Mural Reviviendo la Historia de Quintero (Mural Reviving the History of Quintero) on the cliff face left of the cave entrance. The wall was painted in black and the portraits of the most important people of the city history were painted in white. Beneath the cave there is a spectacular straight gorge which was eroded by the waves from the north. Its obvious that there is fracture zone in the rock which allowed faster erosion of the rock and is responsible for the straightness. The gorge can be seen from the outlook on top, but when the visitor walks down the other side and enters the cave, the cave is actually a through-cave which is the end of this gorge.

The site is freely accessible and requires good shoes and a torch. There is obviously garbage in the seawater close to a big city, and its often deposited in the cave by the waves. So some visitor criticise that the site is dirty and smelly.