San Isidro is the corporate and embassy district of Lima — glass-and-steel office towers, gated luxury houses, and the bulk of the city's banks line its avenues. It's largely residential away from the main streets, and its real attraction for visitors is the Bosque El Olivar, a 16th-century olive grove of more than 1,600 trees, planted from Spanish saplings and now an unusual urban park with footpaths between gnarled, eight-metre trunks.
The district also has a small pre-Inca pyramid (Huaca Huallamarca), one of Lima's best concentrations of fine-dining restaurants on Calle El Carmen, and several international-grade hotels. Quieter than Miraflores or Barranco, and a sensible base for business travellers.