Missing from many tourist maps, Chacarita Cemetery is Argentina’s largest graveyard and the stomping ground for the ghosts of yellow fever victims who have escaped from their derelict graves. Struck with the mosquito borne epidemic in 1871, up to 25,000 Argentines died with blood weeping from their eyes and mouths as they vomited bloody bile.
The posh La Recoleta Cemetery refused infected bodies, so the city commissioned Chacarita as a place to bury thousands of unfortunate porteños (locals). So many bodies were packed into the earth that the authorities built a train line just to transport the dead. Tiptoe past cracked graves, peer into vandalised mausoleums and slather on high DEET bug spray to keep those deadly mozzies at bay.
Take the subway line B to Federico Lacroze station – the cemetery is just a bone’s throw away…
Entry to the cemetery is free.
There is little signage and maps are hard to come by so expect to get a bit lost.
Chacarita Cemetery
cementeriochacarita.com.ar
The roads inside the cemetery are wide enough to cruise around easily in a car if you’re feeling super lazy.