Four days in Ouro Preto: gold built it, and running out of gold preserved it

Three nights in the Minas Gerais highlands: the square where the conspiracy ended, Aleijadinho's churches, a gold mine you walk into, and a steam train to Mariana next door.

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Length
4 days, 3 nights
Where you stay
Ouro Preto
Places
9 across 4 days
OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap

In the eighteenth century this hillside produced a large share of the gold in the world, and the people who dug it out of the mountains were mostly enslaved Africans working for a Portuguese crown that took a fifth of everything. The money bought churches. There are more than a dozen of them in a town of seventy thousand, several of them among the best baroque buildings anywhere in the Americas, all within twenty minutes of one another on foot.

Then the gold thinned out. The capital moved to a purpose-built city down the road in 1897, the money went with it, and nobody had a reason to knock anything down. What is left is a whole colonial town of cobbles, red roofs and blue-painted window frames folded into a valley at 1,200 metres, protected since 1980 as the first place in Brazil to be listed by UNESCO.

Three nights is the right length. The town itself is a day of churches and a day underground, and Mariana, nine kilometres away and connected by a steam train at weekends, is worth its own day rather than a rushed afternoon.

Highlights

  • Sao Francisco de Assis, the church Aleijadinho designed and carved, and the reason art historians come here
  • The interior of Pilar, with something like 400 kilograms of gold on the walls
  • Walking into the Chico Rei mine, along tunnels cut by hand by the men whose gold paid for the churches above
  • The 1701 German organ in Mariana cathedral, played at a free concert twice a week
  • The steam train between the two towns, which still runs on Fridays and weekends

Where to stay

Ouro Preto

The town wraps around two hillsides with Praca Tiradentes on the ridge between them, so almost every walk is up one side and down the other. The Franciscan church, the main museums and the theatre are within two minutes of the square. Pilar is downhill to the west. The mines and the hill churches of the old African quarter are east, ten to twenty minutes on foot and steeply so.

Three nights gives one afternoon to the square and the conspiracy museum, one full day to the Franciscan church, the mine and the hill above it, and one to Mariana, with a last morning down at the gold-lined church in the western valley before the bus.

Day by day

Day 1 in Ouro Preto

Praca Tiradentes and the men who were hanged for it

Arrive, drop the bags, and go up to the square, which is the only flat place in town and where everything starts. It is named after a dentist.

In 1789 a group of poets, priests, officers and mine owners here planned to break Minas Gerais away from Portugal, inspired by what the American colonies had just done. They were betrayed before they began. The Portuguese hanged one of them, Joaquim Jose da Silva Xavier, known as Tiradentes because he pulled teeth, quartered the body and displayed the pieces along the road as a warning. He is now on the banknotes.

The museum on the south side of the square tells that story in the building where several of the conspirators were tried. It is the right first stop, because everything else here makes more sense afterwards.

  1. 15:00

    Praça Tiradentes

    Architecture

    The centre of the town and its only level ground, with the mining school on one side and the old governor's jail on the other, and a view down both valleys from the corners. Everything else is uphill or downhill from here.

  2. 16:15

    Museu da Inconfidência

    Culture

    The old jail and courthouse, now the museum of the 1789 conspiracy, holding the remains of several of the men executed for it along with furniture, tools and religious sculpture from the gold century. There are works by Aleijadinho here and it is the best single introduction to the town.

  3. 19:30

    Dinner off the square

    Eat

    The streets running downhill from Praca Tiradentes have most of the town's restaurants within three minutes' walk. Order feijao tropeiro and something with pork, and eat early: the town closes sooner than you expect.

With more time: The mineralogy museum in the mining school on the north side of the square is better than it sounds if you have an hour: this is a town that exists because of rocks. The streets running downhill in every direction are the real attraction on a first evening, and they are lit well enough to wander.

Day 2 in Ouro Preto

Aleijadinho's church, the mine below it, and the church the miners built

One church, one mine and one hill, in that order, and the day tells the whole story of the place.

Sao Francisco de Assis was designed by Aleijadinho, who also carved the soapstone medallion over the door, the pulpits and much of the altar, and was painted inside by Manuel da Costa Ataide, whose ceiling shows a Virgin with the features of a mixed-race Brazilian woman rather than a European one. That was not a small thing to do in 1800.

Then go down into a tunnel. The gold that paid for all of it came out of passages that run under the whole town, cut by hand by enslaved Africans, and walking a few hundred metres into one bent double explains more than any museum does. Finish on the hill above, at the church that community built for itself.

  1. 09:30

    Igreja de São Francisco de Assis

    Religious

    Begun in the 1760s to Aleijadinho's design and finished over the following decades: a curved rococo facade, twin cylindrical towers and an interior where the carving, the painted ceiling and the proportions all belong to one hand. Small, and worth an hour rather than fifteen minutes.

  2. 11:30

    Mina Chico Rei

    Visit

    One of the largest mines in the area open to visitors, entered on foot with a guide and a helmet along low tunnels cut into the rock. It is named for Chico Rei, said to have been an African king sold into slavery here who bought his own freedom and then his people's. Cold, wet and low: not for anyone who dislikes enclosed spaces.

  3. 13:30

    Lunch on the eastern lanes

    Eat

    The streets on this side of town have small family places serving one or two dishes a day at a fair price, and they are quieter than anything near the square. Ask what is on rather than reading a menu.

  4. 15:00

    Igreja Santa Efigênia

    Visit

    A hilltop church dedicated to an Ethiopian saint, built by and for the enslaved African population who were barred from worshipping in the churches they had paid for. The story is that its gold came out of the mine below in the miners' hair and fingernails. The view back over the town from the terrace is the best in Ouro Preto.

With more time: The rival brotherhood's church across the valley holds the last work Aleijadinho did before his hands failed him entirely, and the little museum of household shrines beside it is the most quietly interesting collection in town. A tiny chapel from 1710 sits ten minutes further east and is among the oldest buildings in the region.

Day 3 in Ouro Preto

Mariana by steam train, and the organ concert

Mariana is the older town, founded before Ouro Preto and the seat of the bishop, and it is flatter, quieter and much less visited. It also has the one thing Ouro Preto does not: a cathedral with a German baroque organ in it, sent out from Hamburg in the early eighteenth century as a royal gift and still played.

The way to get there is the steam train, which runs on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays along the river between the two towns. Check the timetable and buy ahead in high season; if the day is wrong for the train, the bus takes twenty five minutes.

Time the visit around the organ. Concerts are free and short, and hearing a three-hundred-year-old instrument in the church it was built for is worth building the day around.

  1. 09:00

    Maria Fumaça

    Visit

    A restored steam locomotive hauling wooden carriages between the two towns, along the valley and over the river. Weekends only, one run each way, and the open-sided carriages at the back are the ones to sit in.

  2. 10:45

    Catedral de Nossa Senhora da Assunção

    Religious

    Built between 1709 and 1750 and worked on by Aleijadinho, his father and the painter Ataide. The reason to come is the organ, made in Germany in 1701 and given by the Portuguese king, with free concerts on Friday mornings and Sunday lunchtimes.

  3. 12:30

    Lunch on the main square in Mariana

    Eat

    Mariana's squares have restaurants under the arcades doing the same mineiro cooking for rather less than Ouro Preto charges, and with more locals in them. An hour and a half is right.

  4. 14:30

    Igreja São Francisco de Assis

    Religious

    Built between 1763 and 1794 and decorated by several painters including Ataide, who is buried inside it. It stands on a sloping square opposite a second church, an arrangement that is the picture everybody takes of Mariana.

With more time: The archdiocesan museum of sacred art here holds the region's best collection outside the state capital and takes an hour. There is also a much bigger mine on the road between the two towns, where a wooden cart takes visitors 120 metres down to an underground lake, and it is easily fitted in on the way back by bus.

Day 4 in Ouro Preto

Half a tonne of gold, then the bus

One last church before leaving, and it is the one most visitors are least prepared for. From outside it is a plain grey box at the bottom of the western valley, ten minutes downhill from the square.

Inside, almost every surface is covered. The brotherhood that built it were the richest in town and they spent accordingly, and the effect in a small space is closer to overwhelming than beautiful.

Buses to Belo Horizonte leave hourly from the terminal above the town, so a mid-morning start is enough. Allow three hours to the airport.

  1. 09:15

    Igreja de Nossa Senhora do Pilar

    Religious

    The oldest church in the town, completed in 1731 and designed by one of Aleijadinho's teachers. Something like 450 kilograms of gold and 400 of silver went onto the carved interior, and the museum of sacred art in the basement is included in the ticket.

With more time: With a later bus, the old treasury building on the way back up the hill was where the gold was weighed, taxed and stamped, and the stone vault where it was stored can be walked through. The theatre on the corner of the main square, which opened in 1770 and claims to be the oldest still working in South America, can usually be seen during the day for a small fee.

Before you go

Getting there and getting around

There is no airport. Fly to Belo Horizonte, which has flights from every big Brazilian city, and take a bus or a transfer for the remaining 100 kilometres. Buses run through the day from the Belo Horizonte terminal and take about two hours; the airport itself is north of the city, so allow three hours door to door and check the timetable before landing late.

Once here, nothing is driven. The whole historic town is walked, and there is no getting around the fact that it is built on the side of a mountain: the streets are steep, the cobbles are large, round and uneven, and a shortcut on the map can be a hundred steps. Bring shoes with grip rather than sandals, and take the taxis that wait on the main square when a hill defeats you.

Mariana is nine kilometres east. Local buses run every half hour and take twenty five minutes. The steam train is far better and runs Friday, Saturday and Sunday, roughly one departure each way per day, so it needs planning around.

Churches, tickets and opening hours

Almost every church here charges a small entry fee, takes cash, closes for a long lunch and shuts entirely on one day of the week, and no two agree on which day. Several ban photography inside. This is the single most annoying thing about visiting, and the way round it is to do churches between nine and eleven thirty and again from one thirty, and to keep coins on you.

A combined ticket covering several of the main churches is sold at the ones that participate and is worth buying if you plan to see more than three. Sunday mornings most are open for mass and closed to visitors.

The word to know is Aleijadinho, the nickname of Antonio Francisco Lisboa, the mixed-race son of a Portuguese architect who became the greatest sculptor in colonial Brazil and lost the use of his hands to disease in middle age, after which he is said to have worked with chisels strapped to his wrists. His work is all over this town.

When to go

The highlands are cooler and much less humid than the coast. April to September is the dry season, with clear days around 25 degrees and cold nights, sometimes near freezing in July, and almost no rain. October to March is warm, green and wet, with afternoon storms and mist that fills the valley.

Holy Week is the town's great event: carpets of coloured sawdust laid across the cobbles overnight, processions through the streets, and every room booked. Carnival is a student affair here and very busy, because Ouro Preto is a university town and the mining school's fraternity houses take it seriously.

Out of those weeks it is quiet midweek and busy at weekends with Brazilian visitors from Belo Horizonte and Rio.

Eating

Mineiro cooking is the best-loved regional food in Brazil and it is farm cooking: pork, beans cooked with cassava flour, collard greens, chicken with okra, and a hard yellow cheese that people carry home by the kilo. The dish to order is feijao tropeiro, the muleteers' beans, and the sweet to buy is doce de leite in a wooden box.

Lunch is the meal. Look for a place with a wood stove and a buffet, pay by weight or by the plate, and expect to be finished by two. Dinner options are thinner and the town goes quiet early except on student nights.

Cachaca is made all over these hills and the good stuff is aged in local hardwoods. The bars around the main square sell it by the measure with a slice of cheese.

Where to stay

Stay inside the historic centre, within a few streets of Praca Tiradentes. Almost everything worth seeing is walkable from there, and the alternative, a modern hotel out on the ring road, means a taxi every time you want dinner.

The pousadas in restored colonial houses are the pleasure here and there are a lot of them at every price. Ask for a room with a view down the valley and check how many steps there are between the front door and the square, because the answer is sometimes a hundred.

Ouro Preto is a hard town to walk and an easy one to like. Everything is close, almost nothing is level, and the reward for the climb is usually a door that opens into a room covered in gold.

Come midweek if you can. At the weekend the buses from Belo Horizonte fill the square, and on a Tuesday morning you can have a church built by a genius entirely to yourself.

Or make it a longer trip

These trips pass through here on the way somewhere else.

Make it your trip

Every stop, day and place here lands in your account as an editable trip. Move the days around, swap a city, add your own bookings and costs, and share it with whoever is coming.

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Common questions

How many days do you need in Ouro Preto?
Two nights covers the town itself at a walk. Three lets you add a mine and a full day in Mariana, which is what makes the trip worth the journey from Belo Horizonte. More than four and you would be better off moving on to Tiradentes or Diamantina.
How do you get to Ouro Preto?
Fly to Belo Horizonte, then a bus from the city terminal, roughly two hours through the hills. There is no train and no airport. Allow three hours from the airport itself, and book a private transfer if you land in the evening.
Is it difficult to walk around?
Yes, and this is the thing people underestimate. The town is built on two steep hillsides paved with large round cobbles, and there are staircases where a map shows a street. Anyone with limited mobility will find much of it hard going; taxis wait on the main square and can reach most of the churches.
Ouro Preto or Tiradentes?
Ouro Preto is bigger, steeper, more spectacular and busier, with the important churches and the mines. Tiradentes is smaller, flatter, prettier and more of a weekend town, with better restaurants and less to see. If you have one visit in you, this is the one.
When does the steam train to Mariana run?
Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, with roughly one departure in each direction, and it does not run in every season. Check before fixing the day around it, and take the bus if the timetable does not work: Mariana is worth the trip either way.