Most Dangerous Shanty Towns in South America to Visit

Most Dangerous Shanty Towns in South America to Visit

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Most Dangerous Shanty Towns in South America to Visit

Last updated: April 2026 · 12 min read

Let's start with the framing problem. The phrase "most dangerous shanty towns to visit" treats people's homes as theme parks. That's wrong, and the journalism this title implies is the kind that gets communities photographed from minibus windows by tourists who never speak to a resident.

So here's the honest version. Informal settlements across South America , favelas in Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo, villas miseria in Buenos Aires, comunas in Medellin and Cali, barrios in Caracas - are residential neighborhoods. Hundreds of thousands of people live, work, raise kids, run businesses, and go about ordinary life in them. Some of these communities have built legitimate tourism economies around resident-led tours that fund local NGOs, schools, and arts programs. Others are statistically among the most dangerous urban areas on the planet and should not be visited as a tourist under any circumstances.

This piece sorts them out. It also pushes back on the entire "danger tourism" framing, because that framing is bad for the communities and bad for travelers.

TL;DR: Tourist-friendly community-led visits are possible in Rocinha and Vidigal (Rio), Comuna 13 (Medellin), Santa Marta (Rio), and limited tours of Villa 31 (Buenos Aires). Avoid Mare and Pavao-Pavaozinho (Rio), the Caracas barrios entirely, and Cali's Aguablanca district. Book only resident-guided walking tours that channel revenue back to the community . Not the open-jeep "favela safari" operators widely criticized as exploitative. Single biggest tip: don't go without a community-led guide. Ever.

Why this topic deserves careful framing

The whole genre of "favela tourism" or "informal settlement tourism" sits on an ethical fault line. Plus plus done well, it generates income for local economies, breaks down stigma, and gives visitors a real sense of how a city actually works. Done badly, it's poverty as spectacle . Minibuses with tinted windows rolling through narrow alleys while tourists snap photos of children playing.

The communities themselves have mixed feelings. And and in Comuna 13 in Medellin, residents have largely embraced tourism as part of the neighborhood's reconciliation story; in parts of Rio's Mare complex, residents have actively pushed back against tour operators. Both responses are valid. Both deserve to be respected.

What this means for you as a traveler: research the operator before you book. Ask whether they employ residents as guides. Ask whether revenue flows back into the community. Ask whether the experience is interactive , meeting people, eating in family-run kitchens, learning the actual history . And or whether it's basically a drive-by with a camera.

If you can't answer those questions, don't book the tour.

Favelas in Rio: tourist-friendly Rocinha, Vidigal, and Santa Marta

Rocinha is the largest favela in Brazil. And population estimates range from 70,000 to over 200,000 depending on which census you trust, and it sprawls up the hills between Sao Conrado and Gavea in Rio's South Zone. It's also the most established favela tourism destination in the country.

I've taken a Rocinha walking tour with a local guide who grew up in the community. We started at the top of the hill and walked down through the bakery district, past the samba school, into a community center funded partly by tour proceeds. Half-day walking tours from operators like Rocinha Tour and Favela Tour Rio run $30 to $65 USD and are typically 3 to 4 hours. The guides are residents. And the money largely stays.

Vidigal sits next to Leblon and Ipanema on the south side of the same ridge. And it was pacified in 2011 and has since developed into something between a favela and a hipster enclave . There's a boutique hotel called Mirante do Arvrao with striking views, a couple of bars, and a steady stream of weekend visitors. Tours here tend to be shorter and lighter on history, heavier on views. Still resident-led, still legitimate.

Santa Marta in Botafogo is smaller and famous for a different reason: Michael Jackson filmed the "They Don't Care About Us" video there in 1996. The community has built a small tourism economy around the bronze MJ statue at the lookout, plus walking tours covering the funicular, the murals, and the post-pacification history.

All three are visited via reputable community-led operators. Book direct where possible.

Favelas in Rio to avoid: Mare and Pavao-Pavaozinho

Mare is a complex of 16 favelas with a combined population of around 140,000 residents along Avenida Brasil between the airport and the city center. But it's controlled by various armed groups, has seen repeated military police incursions, and isn't safe for tourists. Period.

Some operators occasionally claim to run tours of Mare. But don't. The community has been clear about not wanting drive-through tourism, and the security situation is genuinely volatile.

Pavao-Pavaozinho and Cantagalo sit between Copacabana and Ipanema, which means tourists end up there by accident more often than the rest of Rio's favelas combined. Cantagalo has a community elevator that's a legitimate tourist viewpoint and feels reasonably safe during the day. Pavao-Pavaozinho is less stable. The pacification project that ran there from 2009 onward has unraveled in recent years, and there have been periodic shootouts in zones close to the tourist beaches.

If you're staying in Copacabana or Ipanema, stick to the Cantagalo elevator viewpoint. So don't wander deeper. Don't accept random walking tours pitched to you on the beach.

Sao Paulo: Paraisopolis and Heliopolis

Sao Paulo's two largest favelas sit in unexpected places. Paraisopolis is wedged directly against Morumbi, one of the wealthiest districts in the city, and the visual contrast , high-rises with helipads on one side of a wall, dense favela on the other - is the most photographed thing about it. Population is around 100,000.

Heliopolis is the largest, with around 200,000 residents, in the southeast of the city. It has an active community arts scene, including the Instituto Baccarelli music program that trains young classical musicians.

Both have some community-organized visits but nothing close to the developed tourism infrastructure of Rio or Medellin. But if you want to see one, work through a community organization rather than a commercial tour operator. So realistically, most travelers to Sao Paulo skip favela visits entirely, and that's a fine choice.

Medellin Comuna 13: the success story

Comuna 13 is the example everyone points to when arguing that this kind of tourism can work.

The history matters. In 2002, the Colombian military and police ran Operation Orion and Operation Mariscal in Comuna 13 . But the largest urban military operations in Colombia's history , to dislodge the FARC, ELN, and paramilitary groups that controlled the neighborhood. But hundreds were killed or disappeared. The community spent the next decade processing that trauma.

Reconciliation gathered pace from around 2008 to 2014. And the city installed outdoor escalators in 2011 to connect the steep hillside to the rest of Medellin. Graffiti artists turned the walls into open-air galleries. Plus hip-hop crews started performing at the lookout points. Tourism followed.

I've taken the Comuna 13 walking tour with a community guide who lived through Operation Orion as a teenager. Real City Tours and the official Comuna 13 community tour both run guided walks for $25 to $45 USD, typically 3 hours, including the escalators, the murals, a hip-hop performance, and a stop at one of the family-run mango pop ice stands. So the neighborhood receives over a million tourist visits annually as of recent years.

Is it touristy? Plus absolutely. So the main staircase on a Saturday afternoon feels like a music festival. But the model . Community guides, revenue staying local, residents framing their own story . Is the closest thing this whole topic has to a working blueprint. It's a signature visit on most Medellin itineraries for good reason.

Cali Aguablanca and Siloe: avoid except organized

Cali has two informal settlement zones tourists hear about. They should be treated very differently.

Siloe is on a hillside in the western part of the city and has built a Comuna-13-style tourism program in the last few years. Walking tours run by community guides cover the cable car, the murals, and the local history. So with a guide, it's reasonably safe and worth visiting if you're in Cali and want to understand the city beyond the salsa clubs.

Aguablanca is a different situation. And it's a sprawling district in the east of Cali , actually a cluster of comunas , with some of the highest homicide rates in Colombia. There's no meaningful tourist infrastructure. So going as a foreign visitor is genuinely risky and offers no upside. Skip it.

Buenos Aires Villa 31: limited tours

Villa 31 sits behind the Retiro train station in central Buenos Aires, with around 40,000 residents. It's been there since the 1930s and has gone through repeated cycles of eviction, formalization, and political fights over its future.

There are some community-led tours, but the scene is much smaller than Rio or Medellin. Most are run through NGOs or social-purpose organizations rather than tourism companies, and they tend to focus on the social and political history of the villa miseria. But group sizes are small. Bookings are limited.

If you're interested, contact organizations doing community work in the villa rather than searching for "Villa 31 tour" on standard booking platforms. Treat the visit as a learning experience, not a sightseeing stop.

Caracas barrios: genuinely don't go

Caracas is in a different category from anywhere else on this list.

Petare, in the east of the city, is one of the largest informal settlements in Latin America with around 370,000 residents. And catia, Antimano, and the 23 de Enero district have similar profiles. These neighborhoods have homicide rates that put Caracas consistently among the most dangerous cities in the world by per-capita murder rate, with various sources citing rates over 100 per 100,000 in the worst years.

There's no tourist tourism scene. So the US State Department has Venezuela at its highest travel advisory level. Most embassies advise their citizens against any non-essential travel to the country, let alone to specific high-crime neighborhoods within it.

If you're a tourist reading this article: don't go to Caracas barrios. Don't go on a tour that promises to take you. Don't accept an invitation from a local you met online. And the risk profile is genuinely different and the security situation isn't something a community-led walking tour can offset.

What community-led tours actually do

The good ones do four things at once.

They employ residents as guides and pay them properly, which means tourism dollars become local wages instead of flowing to operators based in tourist neighborhoods. And they route revenue to community organizations . Schools, libraries, music programs, sports clubs . Through formal partnerships. So they give visitors something more useful than photos: real history, real conversation, real food, real context. And they act as a feedback channel back to residents, so the community decides what tourism in the neighborhood looks like.

The bad ones do the opposite. Operators based outside the community keep the margins. Visitors get a 90-minute drive-through with no resident interaction. The neighborhood gets stigmatized rather than humanized. And the phrase "favela safari" exists because that genre of tour has been around for two decades and has been criticized that whole time.

Before booking, ask the operator who their guides are, where the money goes, and how long the tour spends actually walking versus driving.

Ethical tourism considerations

A short list of questions worth sitting with before any informal settlement visit:

Does the operator employ residents? If the guide commutes in from Copacabana, that's a flag.

Does revenue stay in the community? Some of the better operators publish their NGO partners and approximate revenue splits.

Are residents involved in shaping what the tour shows? In Comuna 13, the murals and routes have been picked by community artists; in some other operations, the route is set by the tour company with no community input.

Is the experience interactive and educational? But meeting a baker, eating with a family, watching a rehearsal . That's interactive. Riding through narrow alleys taking pictures of strangers isn't.

Has the community invited tourism, or merely tolerated it? Rocinha and Comuna 13 have actively built tourism into their economies. But mare has not. But the distinction matters.

If most of these answers are unclear, walk away.

Photography ethics in residential communities

This one is simple. Ask before you photograph people. And always. And in any informal settlement on this list, every person you see is at home . In their kitchen, on their stoop, walking their kid to school. Pointing a camera at them without permission is exactly the same etiquette violation as it would be in a residential street in your own city.

Wide shots of streets and architecture are generally fine. Murals, escalators, and viewpoints are what they're there for. Faces require consent.

Don't film inside homes or shops without explicit permission from whoever runs the place. If a guide tells you not to photograph a particular street or person, that instruction overrides your travel content goals.

When NOT to visit informal settlements

Skip the visit entirely if:

You can't find a community-led operator and are tempted to "just walk in." Don't.

You're planning to go alone after dark. Even in pacified favelas, after-dark security is a different equation.

The community in question is currently experiencing active conflict. Rio's favelas in particular cycle through periods of stability and instability; check recent news before booking.

The operator's marketing is heavy on "danger," "raw," "off-limits," or "real" framing. Those are exploitation flags.

Your honest motivation is photographs for social media rather than understanding a place. There's nothing wrong with skipping informal settlements on a Rio or Medellin trip. Plenty of travelers do, and their trips are no worse for it.

Comparison: eight communities

Community City Organized tour available? Safety with guide Ethical considerations
Rocinha Rio de Janeiro Yes, well established Generally safe daytime Largest favela; mature tourism economy; resident-led ops legitimate
Vidigal Rio de Janeiro Yes Safe daytime Gentrifying; lighter on history, heavy on views
Santa Marta Rio de Janeiro Yes Safe daytime MJ video site; small scale; community-managed
Mare Rio de Janeiro No, avoid Not safe Active conflict; community has resisted drive-through tourism
Comuna 13 Medellin Yes, very developed Safe with guide 1M+ visitors annually; strong reconciliation narrative; touristy but functional
Siloe Cali Yes, growing Safe with guide Community model similar to Comuna 13
Villa 31 Buenos Aires Limited, NGO-led Safe on organized tour Small scale; political/historical focus
Petare Caracas No Not safe Among highest murder rates globally; don't visit

My honest take

Skip the "most dangerous shantytown" framing entirely. The travelers who get this right either book a 3-hour community-led walk in Comuna 13 or Rocinha and have dinner with residents afterward , that's the responsible version, and it's genuinely worthwhile , or they don't visit informal settlements at all, which is also a fine choice.

The spectacular danger tourism framing is bad for the communities, bad for travelers, and produces journalism and content that makes both sides worse off. So pick the responsible version or skip it. There's no good third option.

FAQ

Is it actually safe to visit Rocinha or Comuna 13?

With a community-led guide during daylight hours, both are reasonably safe and visited by hundreds of thousands of tourists annually. And without a guide, the risk profile changes significantly. Both communities have areas where tourists shouldn't wander, and a resident guide is the difference.

How much should I expect to pay for a legitimate tour?

Comuna 13 walking tours run $25 to $45 USD for 3 hours. Rocinha half-day walking tours run $30 to $65 USD. Tip the guide on top of that. And if a tour is much cheaper, it's likely a drive-through. If it's much more expensive, you're paying for branding rather than experience.

Can I just walk in on my own?

In Comuna 13, the main escalator route is genuinely fine to walk independently during the day, but you'll miss most of what makes the visit worthwhile. In Rocinha, walking in alone isn't recommended. In Villa 31 or any Caracas barrio, don't.

Are these tours exploitative?

The "favela safari" model , open jeeps, no resident interaction, photo-tourism framing - is widely criticized as exploitative. The walking-tour model with resident guides and revenue flowing to community organizations is broadly accepted as legitimate. The format you book matters more than the destination.

What should I wear?

Normal walking clothes. But no expensive jewelry, no large camera bags hanging open, no visible electronics beyond a phone. Same dress sense you'd apply to any major-city tourist neighborhood after dark.

Is photography allowed?

Wide shots of architecture, murals, and viewpoints are generally fine. Photographing people requires permission. Your guide will tell you which streets or moments are off-limits . Listen.

What if I just want to skip this entirely?

Completely valid choice. Plus rio, Medellin, Buenos Aires, and Sao Paulo all offer plenty of trip without any informal settlement visit. Nobody loses points for opting out.

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