Argentina 2 Day Itinerary

Two days can’t cover a country the size of Argentina, so the smart split is one day soaking up Buenos Aires and one day chasing a waterfall system that dwarfs Niagara, rather than trying to squeeze in a taste of everything.

Day 1: Buenos Aires

Ezeiza International Airport sits about 40 minutes from downtown under normal traffic, and a pre-booked remise (a private car booked at a fixed rate rather than metered) runs somewhere around 45 dollars, while a standard metered taxi can end up costing more if traffic backs up on the way in, so the remise is usually the better bet for a predictable price. Check in and start the day with medialunas and coffee, the standard Argentine breakfast, before heading to La Recoleta Cemetery, a genuinely startling place with mausoleums stacked like a miniature city; Eva Peron is buried here in the Duarte family vault, tucked several meters underground reportedly to deter the grave robbing attempts that targeted her body decades ago. From there, Puerto Madero’s converted brick docklands, now lined with glass towers and a striking Calatrava-designed footbridge, make a solid contrast before heading to Caminito in La Boca, the brightly painted alley that started as a working-class immigrant neighborhood and is now equal parts genuine and tourist theater; keep to the main pedestrian stretch here, since a few blocks off it the area gets rougher than most visitors expect.

For dinner, a proper parrilla is non-negotiable: order asado de tira (short ribs) or a bife de chorizo and let the waiter walk you through cuts if the menu’s unfamiliar. Follow it with a tango show in San Telmo, ideally one that doesn’t bundle a mediocre dinner into an inflated ticket price, since the better venues let you eat elsewhere and pay a lower cover for just the show. My take: skip the touristy dinner-and-tango combo package and book the show alone, then eat at a parrilla you actually chose, since the food at bundled tango venues is reliably worse than what’s two blocks away.

Things to know: Buenos Aires runs on Argentine Standard Time, three hours behind GMT, and Spanish is the everyday language, with English mostly confined to hotels and larger tourist operations. Argentina overhauled its currency controls in 2025, and by 2026 the informal blue dollar rate sits within a few percent of the official and card rates, so there’s no longer a strong reason to arrive with a stack of cash the way travelers did a few years back; a card covers most spending, with a couple hundred dollars in cash on hand for taxis and small purchases. Tap water is safe in Buenos Aires. If it’s football season, a night at La Bombonera watching Boca Juniors is one of the most intense atmospheres in world sport, worth the ticket-buying hassle if the schedule lines up.

Day 2: Iguazu Falls

An early flight to Puerto Iguazu (just under two hours from Buenos Aires) gets you to the falls with most of the day still ahead. Entrance to the Argentine side runs roughly the peso equivalent of 35 to 45 dollars for international visitors, though the exact figure shifts with inflation more than most countries’ park fees do, so check the current rate before budgeting. The Upper Circuit trail gives sweeping views across dozens of individual cascades, but the real payoff is the free Eco-Train included in admission, which runs out to Garganta del Diablo (Devil’s Throat), a horseshoe-shaped drop where the water volume is loud enough to feel through the boardwalk; get a train ticket the moment you enter the park, since afternoon departures fill up and the last train back leaves around 3:30pm. The Argentine side offers far more trail access and closer contact with the falls than the Brazilian side across the border, which trades that for a single panoramic overlook, so if you only have one day, Argentina is the stronger choice. Spend what’s left of the afternoon in Puerto Iguazu town for dinner, and if you’re not wiped out, a night jungle expedition run by a licensed local operator is worth it for the sheer volume of nocturnal wildlife, from owls to caimans, that doesn’t show during the day.

Visa requirements: contrary to older advice still floating around online, most Western passport holders, including the US, UK, EU member states, Canada, and Australia, do not need a visa for tourist stays up to 90 days. What changed more recently is that as of mid-2025 all foreign visitors must show proof of travel health insurance covering the length of their stay, a requirement that didn’t exist a few years ago, so build that into pre-trip planning rather than assuming the old visa-free rules cover everything.

Transportation: domestic flights on Aerolineas Argentinas, LATAM Argentina, or budget carrier Flybondi connect Buenos Aires to Iguazu in under two hours; book at least a couple of weeks out, since prices climb fast closer to departure on this route.

Other things worth doing with more time: try mate properly, sharing the same gourd and bombilla the way locals do rather than treating it as a solo drink, visit a gaucho estancia outside the city for a half-day of horseback riding and asado, or extend north to Salta’s colonial architecture and high-altitude landscapes, or west to Mendoza’s Malbec country, both of which deserve their own multi-day trip rather than a rushed add-on.