Before we ever stayed a night at the Llao Llao, we visited for an afternoon — just to have tea in the Winter Garden and see what all the fuss was about. That distinction matters more than it sounds like it should. A lot of the glowing accounts of this hotel come from guests who had everything comped as part of an expensive room rate, which tells you less than you’d think about whether the tea itself is worth paying for out of pocket. We paid for ours, walked up from a bus stop instead of down from a suite, and only earned an actual room here later. This is what that afternoon involved — and, because prices in Argentina don’t sit still, what it’s likely to cost you now instead of what it cost us.
A Grazing Buffet in a Glass Room
The name suggests scones on a tiered stand and a server topping up your cup on request. That’s not what happens at the Llao Llao. Afternoon tea runs out of the Winter Garden, a glassed-in room built specifically to put the lake and the mountains directly in your sightline while you eat, and it works buffet-style: savory bites first, then a tea service, then a full dessert table, with as many trips back as you can manage. It’s less a formal ceremony and more a very good excuse to graze for a couple of hours in a room with one of the better views you’ll get in northern Patagonia.
Know that going in, because if you’re picturing a delicate plate arriving course by course, you’ll misjudge both the pacing and the strategy. Skip lunch. We showed up hungry on purpose, and a buffet rewards an empty stomach in a way a plated meal never does.
Getting There, and Where You’re Not Free to Roam
Getting there without a car is straightforward, if slow. We were staying out in Villa Campanario, not downtown, so our exact route won’t match yours — but the shape of it holds for anyone based in central Bariloche. A public bus runs from the downtown terminal along Avenida Bustillo all the way to the Llao Llao, and it’s cheap by any standard, provided you’ve loaded a SUBE card before you board — the driver won’t take cash. Budget the better part of an hour each way, and know that once the bus drops you near the property, there’s still a walk uphill to reach the hotel.
A taxi is the other way to get there. We didn’t take one ourselves, but it’s worth knowing it exists for anyone whose reservation doesn’t line up neatly with the bus schedule. Current fare estimates put a one-way trip somewhere in the $30 to $40 USD range, cutting the travel time down to about half an hour. That’s a real premium over the bus, but if you’re short on time, or traveling with people who’d rather not stand around waiting on a SUBE-card top-up, it buys back some flexibility the bus doesn’t offer.
We arrived early, which turned out to be both a mistake and a stroke of luck. Walking up that last stretch of hill, the hotel came into proper view for the first time, and even after years of seeing photos of the place, it still landed — better than we’d expected, which isn’t a sentence we say often. We’d assumed our reservation was for 4:00 p.m. It was actually 4:30. If you’re booking your own, get the exact time confirmed rather than trusting your memory of a phone call — we didn’t, and it cost us half an hour we hadn’t planned for. The upside was that the staff didn’t just park us in a hallway. They offered us the lobby, the main hall with its small shops and photography on the walls, or the outdoor terrace, and since it was a clear day, we took the terrace and let the wait become part of the afternoon instead of dead time before it.
Don’t assume that hospitality extends to the whole property, though. The Llao Llao draws a real line between the spaces open to tea guests and the spaces reserved for people actually sleeping there, and staff told us as much when we asked. That boundary gets enforced beyond a polite suggestion, too — other visitors have reported being turned away from the hotel’s grounds by security with nothing more than “the park is for guests only,” no sign posted anywhere to warn you first. Treat your reservation as access to the Winter Garden and its immediate surroundings, not a day pass to wander the property.
What’s on the Table
The savory round comes out first, and it’s small but well chosen: a mini bagel with cream cheese and salmon, brightened with just enough lime to cut the richness, and a second sandwich stacked with brie, jamón crudo, and avocado that we both went back for instead of trying anything else on the table. We ended up ordering the same combination twice rather than working through the rest of the spread — there was a vegetarian option sitting right there, but once you’ve found the one you like on a buffet, spreading yourself thin for the sake of variety stops making sense.
Tea comes next, and it isn’t the bagged, generic stuff — each of us was poured something distinct. One was a green tea called “Thai Wind,” light-bodied with papaya and passion fruit and an aroma tropical enough to briefly convince us we were somewhere warmer.
The other, “Indian Market,” was a proper chai — cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, the kind of smell that makes you close your eyes before the first sip.
Then the sweets: a strawberry macaron, milk chocolate studded with almonds — the whole region around Bariloche has a real reputation for chocolate, and this tasted like it was earning it — a lemon tart with meringue piled absurdly high and light, and a ricotta cheesecake topped with forest berries that was, without much argument between us, the best thing on the table, the tartness cutting through everything else competing for sweetness. There was also a small pastry finished with a local berry jam neither of us could actually name, which is the kind of minor mystery a buffet like this leaves you with — you eat it, you like it, and you move on without ever finding out what it was called.
We went back for seconds and thirds before staff arrived unprompted with a second round of drinks: hot chocolate for Audrey, thick and rich, exactly how she likes it, and a cappuccino for Samuel. Then, just as we thought the meal was winding down, two glasses of sparkling wine appeared, unasked for, to close things out.
One thing to flag for anyone reading this before booking rather than eating off our exact plates: that basic structure — buffet, two hot drinks, a glass of something bubbly at the end — still seems to hold up in more recent accounts. What varies is the depth of the savory course specifically; some visitors describe a thinner sandwich selection than what we got. Treat the dessert table as the reliable strength and the savory course as the wildcard.
The Price, Then and Now
We paid $52 USD total for the two of us — $26 a head — for the entire spread: unrestricted trips to the buffet, two beverages each, and that closing glass of bubbly. At the time, that felt like genuine value. We went back three or four times and left feeling like we’d more than earned our money’s worth.
That price has moved since, and not in the reader’s favor. The most recent figure we could track down puts the cost closer to $60 USD per person, which means a couple today is likely looking at something in the neighborhood of double what we paid. Quoting an exact peso amount here would be close to useless by the time you read this — the currency has swung hard enough over the past few years that older reviews citing specific figures are more historical curiosity than budgeting tool. Confirm the current price directly with the hotel before you commit; don’t trust any number in this article, or anywhere else, as fixed.
So, Is It Worth It?
We’d do it again. At $26 a head, it wasn’t a close call — genuine luxury, a real sense of occasion, more food than we could finish, in a room with a view most people only ever get to photograph from outside the gates.
What’s changed is the math. At something closer to $60 a person, this stops being an easy yes and becomes a real splurge — one we still think is worth taking once, but only if you go in calibrated to today’s version rather than ours. Recent visitors report more inconsistency than we ran into: some walk away just as delighted as we were, others find the savory course thin and the pacing uneven for what they paid. Even a middling afternoon here still buys you unhurried time inside a building most travelers only see from the road, and for a lot of people, that alone earns its keep.
It’s also worth weighing against the alternative, which is skipping tea altogether and eating at one of the hotel’s restaurants instead. On our way out, we noticed the posted menu for one of them — mains running somewhere in the $17 to $20 USD range, with occasional specials like a sushi night around $15 that reportedly comes with a dozen rolls and a glass of something bubbly thrown in. That’s a real option if tea doesn’t appeal to you, but it buys you a meal, not an afternoon. Tea is the cheaper and, we’d argue, more distinctive way to spend a few hours here as a non-guest — a proper sit-down dinner will cost as much or more, and it won’t come with a cup of chai that smells like a spice market.
Booking It Without Losing Half Your Afternoon
Book ahead, and don’t count on email to get you there. The hotel’s website has no dedicated booking tool for tea specifically — just a phone number, +54 294 4445700, and a general contact form, the same channels it uses for everything else. More than one traveler has reported messages going unanswered for days; a phone call seems to be the more reliable route, even if it means navigating an international call.
Once you’ve got someone on the line, repeat the seating time back before you hang up. We learned that lesson by showing up half an hour early for a reservation we thought started at 4:00 p.m. It worked out fine for us, mostly because the hotel gave us somewhere pleasant to wait — but there’s no guarantee your afternoon unfolds as forgivingly, and no reason to leave it to chance when one follow-up question fixes it.
Skip lunch. Wear something forgiving — you’ll be going back for seconds more than once. And go in treating your reservation as access to one room and its immediate surroundings, not the whole property. The rest of the Llao Llao is still reserved for the people actually sleeping there. We know, because at the time, that wasn’t us yet.
We eventually made it to the other side of that line ourselves. If an afternoon in the Winter Garden leaves you wanting the rest of it, compare current rates for the Bustillo and Moreno wings — that’s where we’d start looking too.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you need to be a hotel guest to have afternoon tea at Llao Llao?
No, non-guests can reserve afternoon tea in the Winter Garden. Access to the rest of the property, including the grounds, is generally reserved for people actually staying overnight.
How do you get to Llao Llao Hotel without a car?
A public bus runs from downtown Bariloche along Avenida Bustillo to Llao Llao, taking roughly an hour each way, though you’ll need a SUBE card loaded in advance since the driver won’t accept cash. A taxi is also an option, cutting the trip to about half an hour for a higher fare.
What’s included in the price of afternoon tea at Llao Llao?
The price covers unlimited trips to the buffet, two beverages per person, and a closing glass of sparkling wine.
How much does afternoon tea at Llao Llao cost?
We paid $52 USD total for two people. More recent pricing suggests it’s closer to $60 USD per person today, roughly double what we paid, so it’s worth confirming the current price directly with the hotel before booking.
Is afternoon tea at Llao Llao a formal tiered tea service?
No, it’s a self-serve buffet in the Winter Garden with a savory course, a tea service, and a full dessert table, rather than a traditional tiered English tea.
How do you book afternoon tea at Llao Llao Hotel?
There’s no dedicated online booking tool for tea specifically. Reservations go through a phone call or the hotel’s general contact form, and a phone call tends to be the more reliable route since email inquiries have been reported as slow or unanswered.
Should you eat lunch before going to afternoon tea at Llao Llao?
Skipping lunch and arriving hungry is worth it, since the buffet format rewards being able to eat multiple rounds.
Project 23 Argentina: This guide is also available in Spanish. [Leé la versión en castellano: Té de la tarde en el Llao Llao Hotel: menú, experiencia y si vale la pena]
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