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| This restored mansion also served as a tenement for dozens of families a century ago |
Monday, October 30 - San Telmo, Buenos Aires
El Zanjon de Granados is a 200 year old mansion that has been transformed into a museum. It is situated over a series of underground tunnels that offer historical value, dating back to Buenos Aires’ earliest settlements.
El Zanjón translates to “the hole.” Within the underground tunnel system, you can see water cisterns, a slave cell, and artifacts, like English china and African pipes, on display. Buenos Aires’s early settlers established a series of underground tunnels, which connected the various residences, but they were forgotten when the city above continued to expand.
In 1830, a 23-room mansion was constructed and occupied, first by a wealthy family and later as tenement apartments for families. The complex was eventually abandoned by the 1970s and used as a dumping ground by locals. The El Zanjón de Granados property was purchased in the 1980’s to be renovated as a restaurant. But the owner decided to preserve its historical value and restore the underground network. The tunnels were originally used to divert water runoff into the river, before the city was tiled and piped. Once that happened, the tunnels were abandoned and filled in. It has taken 20 years to restore the underground network and the mansion before it was opened as a museum.
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| The exterior of El Zanjon |
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| Interior multilevel courtyard with restored original brickwork |
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| Rounded arches are a theme of the construction |
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| The plan of the mansion |
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| An underground cistern to collect water |
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| Our guide stands in front of the largest cistern, where a number of artifacts were discovered |
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| Unique, historical underground network of tunnels used to divert water to the Rio de Plata |
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