Caracas Key Attractions
A mountainous national park towering over the city, El Ávila makes the perfect getaway from the constant noise and confusion in downtown Caracas. A lofty cable car runs to the mountain top from the suburb of Maripérez. The mountain slopes are criss-crossed by trails and there is a tourist complex on the summit (2,175m/7,135ft) that includes a restaurant, ice-rink and several hungry monkeys.
El Ávila Mountain
Tel: (0212) 573 7879.
Website: www.inparques.gob.ve
Free admission.
Museo de Arte Contemporáneo
This gallery is one of the continent's top spots for modern art, with plenty of big names from the national and international stages, including Picasso, Matisse, Miró and the world-famous Venezuelan artist Jesús Soto.
Zona Cultural de Parque Central, Bellas Artes
Tel: (0212) 573 8289.
Website: www.maccsi.org
Free admission.
El Hatillo
One of the city's most beguiling corners, El Hatillo is a colourful colonial village that was gobbled up by the expanding city, but managed to hang on to its small-town charms with brightly painted adobe buildings and a whitewashed little church. Centred on a pretty plaza, it is also the best place in Caracas to shop for handicrafts (see Shopping).
Free admission.
Panteón Nacional
This stately monument is home to the final resting place of national and continental hero El Libertador (The Liberator) Simón Bolívar, as well as other members of Venezuela's historic great and good. An elegant ecclesiastic-style building, it is well worth seeing if only for the murals that smother the ceiling en route to Bolívar's excessively extravagant tomb.
Foro Libertador, Parroquia Altagracia
Tel: (0212) 862 1518.
Free admission.
Capitolio Nacional
Taking up a whole block and covered in gold domes and neoclassical frills, this enormous, stately building dates from the 1870s. It is particularly famous for the murals splashed across the dome of its Salón Elíptico (Oval Hall), which depict the battle of Carabobo in the Wars of Independence.
Plaza Bolívar
Tel: (0212) 564 7589.
Free admission.
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