Where to stay in Argentina

Booking

• Always pay the hotel with a foreign-issued card. That is what triggers the automatic 21% VAT refund, and a cash payment loses it.
• Buenos Aires is good value and the mid-range hotel stock is large. Outside peak weeks you do not need to book far ahead.
• Patagonia is the exception. El Calafate, El Chalten and Bariloche fill for December to February and should be booked months out.
• Mendoza fills for the harvest festival in early March and prices double.

Buenos Aires by neighbourhood

• Palermo is where most visitors should stay: leafy, safe, full of restaurants and bars, well connected. Palermo Soho and Palermo Hollywood are the busy parts.
• Recoleta is grander and quieter, with the cemetery, the museums and the best walking.
• San Telmo is the old city, cobbled and atmospheric, with the Sunday market. Livelier and rougher at the edges.
• Puerto Madero is new, safe, expensive and has no soul at all.
• Avoid staying in Constitucion, Retiro's western edge and the far end of La Boca. La Boca's Caminito is worth a daytime visit and is not a place to wander two streets off it.

Practical

• Check-in is usually 15:00, check-out 10:00 or 11:00.
• Bring your passport. It is copied at check-in and it is what proves you are a non-resident for the VAT refund.
• Air conditioning matters from December to March. Buenos Aires in January is 32 C and humid.
• Heating matters in June to August in Patagonia and the south, and many older Buenos Aires flats are poorly heated.
• Short-term flats are widely rented through the usual platforms and are common in Palermo. Ask about the building's security arrangements, which locals take seriously.