San José de Maipo

The upper Maipo valley was a mining area in colonial times, and on 16 July 1792 the governor Ambrosio O'Higgins founded the Villa de San José de Maipo to support the mines around San Pedro Nolasco. A plot facing the new plaza was set aside for the church and the priest, and Catholic services began the following year. During the wars of independence the valley's passes into Argentina made it a military route: a column of the Army of the Andes under Captain José León Lemos came over the Portillo pass to distract the royalist forces of Marcó del Pont while the main army crossed further north.

Larger-scale mining began at the end of the 19th century, and in the 20th the valley became part of Santiago's infrastructure. The first hydroelectric plant of the area was built at Los Maitenes, an aqueduct began carrying water from the Andean glaciers to the capital, and a narrow-gauge military railway was built from Puente Alto to El Volcán, opening in sections between 1910 and 1914; a tunnel and bridges from the line can still be seen. The pure, dry mountain air drew sanatoriums for patients with lung disease, above all tuberculosis, from all over Chile, among them the Laennec, which began in the 1890s as a hotel for lung patients opened by the Frenchman Emilio Goujon Fournier.

From the late 20th century the canyon turned to tourism, helped by a river well suited to rafting. In 2001 the commune was declared a Zone of National Tourist Interest, and the old centre of the village is protected as a national monument.

San José de Maipo keeps the look of a colonial village. Its parish church and parish house, on the corner of the plaza, were declared a national monument in 1992, the historic centre around them is protected, and the two buildings of the old Laennec sanatorium, also a national monument, stand opposite. The village is the administrative centre of the most thinly populated commune of the Santiago Metropolitan Region, a territory that runs east to the Argentine border.

Its culture is that of a mountain community living between farming, mining and visitors. Craftspeople work the local laja stone and alabaster, almonds and stone fruits are local produce, and a neighbourhood football league brings together around a dozen clubs from across the Cajón. Local radio stations broadcast to the valley, and the old railway, the sanatorium years and the independence column over the Andes are part of how the commune tells its own story.

For Santiago, the Cajón del Maipo is the nearest escape into the Andes: campers, rafters and hikers head up the valley for the river, the reservoir and the glacier, and the village is where they stop for supplies and a meal on the way.

About 18,000 people lived in the commune at the 2017 census, around 70 per cent of them in urban areas, chiefly the village of San José de Maipo itself; the rest live in small settlements strung along the canyon road and its side valleys. Spread over almost 5,000 square kilometres, it is the most thinly populated commune in the region.

The economy mixes non-metallic mining and stone quarrying, crafts and local produce with hydroelectric power — the Los Queltehues, Los Maitenes and Alfalfal plants all draw on the valley's rivers. Tourism has grown into one of the main sources of work, and the commune has a large number of restaurants and lodgings for visitors. The valley's water matters to the whole capital: the El Yeso reservoir and the Laguna Negra are major sources of Santiago's drinking water.

Life follows the seasons: quiet in winter, busy in spring and summer, when visitors from the capital come up the canyon road. Roberto Pérez of the Radical Party is the mayor.

The valley eats the country cooking of central Chile. Empanadas de pino, baked turnovers of minced beef, onion, egg and olive, are the standard roadside meal, along with cazuela, a clear stew with a piece of meat, potato and pumpkin, and, in summer, pastel de choclo, a pie of sweet ground corn over a meat filling. Sopaipillas, fried pastries made with squash, are a street snack, and grilled meat is the centre of weekend gatherings.

Local produce is part of the appeal: almonds and stone fruits from the valley's orchards are local produce, and the vineyards of the Maipo valley, famous for Cabernet Sauvignon, begin just below the canyon at Pirque. Most restaurants are around the village centre or along the Camino al Volcán, many serving lunch, the main meal of the day, to visitors from Santiago. Mote con huesillo, a sweet cold drink of dried peaches in syrup with husked wheat, is a summer refreshment across central Chile, and a glass of pisco sour or local wine usually comes with the meal.