Chile Guide
The Central Valley
Rancagua
RANCAGUA presents a picture that is to repeat itself in most of the Central Valley towns – large, well-tended plaza; single-story adobe houses; a few colonial buildings; sprawling, faceless outskirts. It is, however, a particularly affluent version of the model, evident in the modern malls and department stores found in its centre, and in the care the municipality has lavished on the town's historic buildings. Unusually, its square is known not as the Plaza de Armas, but as the Plaza de los Héroes, honouring the patriot soldiers, headed by Bernardo O'Higgins, who defended the city against Royalist forces in 1814, only to be crushed in what has gone down in Chilean history as the "Disaster of Rancagua".
No account of Rancagua could fail to mention its fame as Chile's rodeo capital, hosting the national rodeo championships during the last week of March or the first week of April in its medialuna on the northern edge of town. The rodeo season runs from mid-September until the championships.
Accommodation is basic and cheap at Hotel España, San Martín 367 ( 
72/230141; Price: CH$15000-25000), which offers quiet, pleasant (if slightly neglected) rooms around an interior patio in an old, colonial-style building. Hotel Rancagua, a few blocks north at San Martín 85 ( 72/232663, 
hotelrancagua@chile.com, 
www.hotelrancagua.galeon.com/ ; Price: CH$25000-35000), has reasonably comfortable rooms upstairs in the main house, but better ones in an extension out the back. Two other hotels, face-to-face on Brasil, offer basic, if not exactly enchanting, facilities: Turismo Santiago, Brasil 1036 ( 72/230860, 
72/230822, hsantiago@entelchile.net; Price: CH$25000–50000) and the Águila Real, across the street at Brasil 1045 ( 72/222047, 72/223002, hsamour@ctcinternet.cl; Price: CH$25000-35000). In both cases, request a room away from the street for quieter mornings. The rather more stylish Hotel Camino del Rey at Estado 275 ( 72/239765, 72/232314, hotelcaminodelrey@terra.cl; Price: CH$35000-50000) boasts an attractive colonial facade, modern rooms, and a good restaurant. If you're looking for somewhere cheaper, your best option is the simple but secure Residencial Ahumada, at Mujica 125 ( 72/225892; Price: CH$5000-10000).
As for eating, you'll find reasonably priced if unexciting dishes such as pollo asado at the Club Social, Cáceres 486. The informal café Reina Victoria, at Independencia 667, serves traditional, set lunches and other snacks.