(Condé Nast Traveller) ‘The best time to visit Buenos Aires? Spring, which begins in September, when parks and wide avenues explode with jacarandas’ violet blossoms. Yet I’ve discovered a new-found affection for the Argentine capital’s striking autumnal hues. This year, the second season in the southern hemisphere has slunk in like a tardy teenager but, given Argentina’s stringent lockdown, autumn has rather taken me by surprise. I make the most of the sun first thing when it hits my balcony at 8am. Buenos Aires’s Indian summer means I’ve only just started enjoying the mustard-shade leaves of fraxinus americana or white ash from my living room (the very handy Arbolado Urbano website tells you which trees have taken root in any given street). But a few days ago, a quick trip out to Salvaje Bakery – bread is deemed a food essential in Argentina, so every now and then I find solace in the shop’s sourdough and medialuna pastries – revealed a crunchy ochre and saffron carpet covering the cobbled streets between my house and the panadería. There was also solace in those crispy leaves, kicking them about as if I really didn’t have a care in the world.’

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