teemuflyer

Got that e-mail today (not my first time)..

"Dear teemuflyer,

We are honored to welcome you to Hilton Buenos Aires, where every detail has been thought of to make your stay the most comfortable and rewarding one.

We recognize time is extremely valuable, especially when travelling. Taking that into account and also being aware of the importance of feeling safe when arriving to a foreign country, we developed a new service to improve the experience of our most loyal guests, VIP HHonors Diamond and Gold Members.

In order to save time and avoid any paperwork when arriving at the hotel, we offer you our “Limo Check in service” which provides you the possibility to check in to the hotel room during the drive from the airport.

The car service provided from Ezeiza international airport to the hotel has a cost of U$ 80 American Dollars plus parking expenses and from Aeroparque Jorge Newbery airport to the hotel has a cost of U$ 40 American Dollars plus parking expenses. One hour waiting time at Ezeiza and half an hour waiting time at Aeroparque are already included; there would be USD 22 Dollars for each additional hour of waiting time. The car has a capacity of up to three persons and it can be charged to your account once you check in. As a part of this special promotion for our HHonors Gold and Diamond guests, we are pleased to offer you a 10% discount.

If you would like to take advantage of this service, please reply to this email providing us your flight number, date and time of arrival, as well as how many passengers and pieces of luggage are travelling with you in order to arrange your pick-up.

If there is any additional assistance you may need during your stay, feel free to contact the Concierge Desk dialing ext. “1181”.

Warm Regards,"

Yeah, doing Tienda Leon, thanks to advice on FT!

chalten

ha ha!! they are telling you the wait time cost, but they did not tell you will have a waiting time if you are flying with the early morning flights during oct-feb, which is the high season in Buenos Aires. Most of the time there is at least one hour. You may be lucky if you arrived before the MIA flights...

anyway there are options for 40/50usd flat with private and avoid the need of a taxi+shuttle...

TomMM

I stayed at this hotel 12/25 -12/29 and during check in at the 8th floor executive desk, the clerk wrote my full CC number, expiration date and CC security code on on my folio and placed it in their file folder. I have never experienced that any where before.

JDiver

I've certainly experienced delays arriving at Ezeiza; paying for an already pricy limo to wait, when I can arrive and walk up to the Tienda León desk and get a perfectly acceptable remise and driver immediately at a lower price makes Tienda León a no brainier.

shonamac

Why did you not object and demand that the folio be destroyed in your presence and a new one created?

rje

Can anyone with experience at this hotel tell me what my chances of being upgraded to executive floor are as a Gold? Search reveals nothing current in this regard. Thanks for any help.

more4less

Hi,

As a Gold I stayed twice and I was upgraded once.
I imagine it depends in the level of occupancy, as usual.

Good luck!

gpapadop

Stayed here some years ago and got upgraded to Room 532 as Gold. Amazing suite! Wife loved the huge walk in closet!

I tried to insert some pics from it but the actual size of them is enormous so I changed my mind.

aves17

Currently staying at this property now during a convention of some sort (I'm here for a wedding though), am gold and got bumped up to the executive floor for my 3 night stay. Excellent hotel and even better staff. Easily one of the best Hilton's I've stayed at in the last several years.

sjc2679

This was meant to form part of a wider trip report of Argentina from March 2015 but since returning I’ve moved house and haven’t had time to post all of it or go through all the photos so I’ll post the Hilton comments here in isolation.

The journey to the hotel took ages from AEP, having arrived on a long weekend where everybody was leaving Buenos Aires but we eventually arrived. When we pulled up, nobody approached to help with cases (wasn't required but just a comment) even though there were a lot of staff standing around. We approached check in, where, as gold, we weren't given an exec room as the hotel was “completely full” (even though we knew everybody was actually leaving the city), and told we could get breakfast in the main dining area. I asked what about a complementary drink in the bar as other Hiltons have done in the past where no lounge access is granted and I was told a bottle of water could be sent up to the room and would I like still or sparkling. At this point I just laughed and said what was the point of being with Hilton as no benefits were ever forthcoming? The front desk clerk then went off and suddenly found a room available. Amazing how a completely full hotel suddenly has availability. (For reference, I asked another time and was told from an Exec floor perspective, the hotel was less than 40% full and the Exec room itself was never more than 30% full.)

I’m aware of the rules. I know that Exec lounge access is subject to room upgrade availability but the benefits offered by Hilton over the last few years have reduced massively and I detest being lied to when there was clearly availability. It was also at this point that somebody then offered to help with the cases but by then it was too late.

The room was a standard Hilton room although without the standard clock radio that appears everywhere else throughout the world, with a view over the Puerto Madero area and the Casa Rosada in the distance.


IMG_7485 by Steve, on Flickr


DSC_1973 by Steve, on Flickr


DSC_1974 by Steve, on Flickr

View from the room

DSC_1979 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7748_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7510_1 by Steve, on Flickr

The Exec lounge was open all day with evening cocktails served from 18:00 - 20:00. A choice of a red, white and sparkling wines, one beer choice but numerous spirits. There was one hot choice each evening, which was chicken wings, a very tasty vegetable filled pancake and chicken nuggets on nights 1-3 respectively, all served with fries. The hot food was brought out at the start and wasn't replaced until either just before or just after 19:00, i.e. half way through. Therefore if you came down after the offering had been raided, you had a long wait until anything else was brought out. The problem with this was most people were in at the start and not the end so the second serving was often taken away full. Wine was regularly replenished but after the initial FOUR cans of beer were put out, you had to ask for them, along with tonic water. If you were lucky, the staff would begrudgingly bring a can out - one at a time.


IMG_7490_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7491_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7495_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7496_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7498_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7499_1 by Steve, on Flickr

Food and drink offerings

DSC_1992 by Steve, on Flickr


DSC_1995 by Steve, on Flickr


DSC_1996 by Steve, on Flickr

Wifi was complementary throughout the hotel



Hotel views

IMG_7500_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7502_1 by Steve, on Flickr


IMG_7505_1 by Steve, on Flickr

After getting Exec lounge access, we had breakfast in the lounge instead of the main hotel restaurant. Bacon and eggs were offered, along with cereals, pastries and yoghurts, along with a 20 minute wait for tomato ketchup.

The hotel is located well in the Puerto Madero area and close enough to the Burquebus terminal for the obligatory day trip to Uruguay.

Upon check out, the front desk clerk couldn't understand why I didn't want to hand my credit card over until I had seen my final bill. I explained that I wanted to make sure there were no additional incorrect charges and was told an invoice should have been posted under the door. It hadn’t been. I commented that I thought that due to the accounts being hacked invoices were no longer posted under the door – I haven’t had one for ages from Hilton but was told that no Hilton account had ever been hacked.

The Hilton Buenos Aires is a nice hotel but has slow service and a very poor attitude to the rate at which food and drink is brought out. If you want to control the rate at which alcohol is consumed, run the drinks as a counter service, like for example in the Hilton Sydney, but to only put out 4 cans of beer at the start of the evening with all subsequent cans needing to be asked for is simply not good enough, neither is having numerous people ask for the water to be refilled for the coffee machine numerous times with requests being ignored.

Please note, all my interactions were in Spanish so language was not an issue.

It's a good hotel but could be so much better.

Gaucho100K

For those regulars at this property... please remember there is a dedicated Argentina Forum, we would love to hear from you and assist you with any/all Argentina specific questions.....

Here is a link to the Argentina Forum:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/argentina-622/

SanDiego1K

How is the length of the pool for a friend used to doing competitive ocean swimming?

This picture was found on their website. What is it?

teemuflyer

A sweat box.. literally!

But to the pool. It's not very large, but likely suitable for laps for your friend, if not too crowded.

Check out the traveler pictures on TripAdvisor for a better idea.

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Rev...ct.html#photos

SanDiego1K

Huh. A sweat box. That's a new one for me.

Thanks for your help.

Canarsie

The pool is certainly not sized for an Olympic event; but it is fairly suitable for laps.

It is located outside on a balcony of the hotel overlooking Puerto Madero; accessible not only from the workout room but also from the Executive Lounge.

I was there in late May some years ago; so the season was autumn going on to winter. The weather was mild; but the pool was barely used during the time I was there — which means that your friend could have completed laps with little interruption or interference at that time.