I’ve lived in Vietnam for over a decade and love my home city of Saigon, but even I admit that Hanoi is the country’s best city for tourists. It’s just so culturally vibrant, walkable, and full of gorgeous natural features like pristine lakes and lush green parks.
It’s also got great food, lots of the best museums in Southeast Asia, and many French colonial buildings that showcase Vietnam’s 20th century history.
This 3-day itinerary is designed to show first-time visitors all the different sides of Hanoi, from history to culture to cuisine to modern metropolis, while avoiding tourist traps and maximising time spent on immersion, and most of the food stops are locally-priced and authentic.
Best picks to fit in your Hanoi itinerary
Before going into further detail on my itinerary, let me first provide you with this quick reference table. It includes each major stop along with the anticipated cost.
| Category | Experience | Price | The tea |
|---|---|---|---|
| 💎 Signature experience | Bike loop around West Lake to Tran Quoc Pagoda | A 2.5-hour guided ebike loop of West Lake including a lotus tea-making workshop | |
| Best place to have lunch | Bun Cha Coi | You assemble your own lunch – Bun cha: Hanoi’s signature dish | |
| Top stay | Royal Holiday Hanoi Hotel | Starts from | A 23-room boutique stay on Hang Hanh, the Old Quarter’s coffee street with dark wood, brass fittings & shuttered windows |
| A landmark not to miss | Thang Long Citadel | You’ll discover dynastic architecture, excavation sites & lantern-lit gardens | |
| Worth booking ahead | Pho Co Ha Noi cooking class with local market tour | Market visit, then beef pho and cha gio with Tien (and a cookbook to take home) | |
| Free and worth it | Old Quarter north-side walking tour | Free walking tour (tip-based) | Covers Dong Xuan Market, the old city gate, and more |
| Catch if you can | Sunset on Banana Island | Cost of dinner | Farms, dirt roads and grazing cows with outdoor seating for the sunset |
Total budget (not including hotel + transport): ~3,362,000 VND ($127.60)
Is 3 days in Hanoi enough?
For the city itself, yes, comfortably. Hanoi’s centre is compact enough to cover on foot and by short Grab rides, and 3 days gets you the Old Quarter, Ba Dinh, the French Quarter, West Lake and a proper look at the food.
If you’ve got a fourth day, I suggest making a day trip to Ninh Binh for the karst scenery.
Settling in and navigating Hanoi
Hanoi rewards a little planning upfront, especially when it comes to timing your visit, choosing where to stay, and getting around.
March – May and September – November are the best windows – spring is warm and busy, autumn is cooler with thinner crowds. You can find more detail in my complete guide to when to visit Vietnam.
I recommend you base yourself in the Old Quarter; Royal Holiday Hanoi puts you within walking distance of most of Day 1. I’ve written a full guide to Hanoi’s neighbourhoods if you’d rather compare areas.
Once you land, get the Grab app. It’s the Southeast Asian equivalent of Uber – cheap, fixed fares, English-friendly, and it books cars or bike taxis. Anytime I write “take a taxi” in this itinerary, I mean to book the vehicle of your choice through the Grab app.
Spotting good street food: I’ve included street food spots in the itinerary that I can vouch for, but one of the best things to do in Hanoi is sniffing out street food spots during your travels. To help you hone your nose for the best spots, a few tips I’d recommend are:
- Avoid places with menus displayed prominently out near the street. If a place is really good, they don’t need a streetside menu to bring in business.
- Places where you can actually see the food being prepared are usually the best. If the ingredients are fresh enough to be displayed, they’re probably tasty too.
- If the place is buzzing with local customers, it’s almost certainly good.
- Street food places or restaurants that serve only one or two dishes are generally the best. Being able to perfect just the specialty recipes makes for the best product. This principle seems to be especially applicable in Hanoi for some reason; I haven’t noticed it as much in other Vietnamese cities.
Day 1: Introduction to Hanoi’s classics
On your first day, you’re going to get real #basic and explore Hanoi’s most iconic sights. This day contains the attractions you’ll see advertised on 95% of Hanoi tour brochures. No points for originality, but there are some genuinely good sights to cover.
A few of the super-mainstream tourist attractions in Hanoi (like the Train Street or Thang Long Water Puppet Theatre) are just tourist traps, and I haven’t included them in the itinerary. But most of them truly earn their spot as iconic attractions.
Also, I am aware that a 7:30 AM start wouldn’t be the natural choice for most travellers, including myself. But setting out early is really important in Hanoi, because the city, even more than other Vietnamese hotspots, comes alive in the early morning.
There are more street vendors and locals hanging about than at any other time of day. If you haven’t experienced Hanoi in the morning, I’d argue you haven’t experienced the city in full effect.
1. Pho 26 in The Old Quarter – Breakfast
Pho 26 is one of the few pho restaurants in Hanoi’s Old Quarter that’s authentic and not marked up to “tourist prices”, but is also very English-friendly and even includes some fun facts about pho on its menu. It also has a lot of really tasty sides like chicken salad, poached egg, and Vietnamese quẩy, similar to an unsweetened churro. They also have a lot of vegan options.
They only serve chicken pho (no beef), but the quality is high.
2. Old Quarter Walking Safari (with a cafe break)
Even though the Old Quarter is overtouristed as sin, it’s a genuinely cool place that rings with colonial-era Vietnamese culture.
Sure, there are some performative touches like the women selling fresh fruit from baskets slung over their shoulders, something you don’t generally see in modern urban Vietnam. But it’s not hurting anyone, and it’s a fun glimpse into Vietnam’s older urban culture that makes for a fun, vibrant atmosphere comparable to the Vietnamese version of a midway at a county fair.
From Pho 26, you should take a walk around the Old Quarter, stopping at some of its best spots and soaking up the atmosphere along the way.
The route I’d recommend taking, in order, is:
- Hang Be Market
- Traditional Shophouses on Luong Van Can & Hang Gai
- Cafe Pho Co
- St. Joseph’s Cathedral
- Back to the hotel
This itinerary keeps you south of the lake, where you find the cathedral, and the many shophouses and cafes. North of there is a different Hanoi: Ta Hien’s beer stalls, Dong Xuan Market, and the old city gate.
This local-guided free walk covers all this ground in about 3 hours. Booking is completely free through GuruWalk. At the end, you simply tip what you think the tour was worth.
book on guruwalk
3. Bun Cha Coi – Lunch
Bun Cha is one of Vietnam’s essential street food dishes, and nowhere is it as good as in Hanoi.
Most common in Hanoi, it’s a spread rather than a single dish: thin rice noodles (bún – pronounced “boon”), pork, a salty-sweet dipping sauce with a little garlic and chili, and fresh herbs – basil, cilantro, green onions, and lettuce.
Bun cha is eaten by combining the ingredients in a small bowl, with each person eating multiple bowls.
Bun Cha Coi is one of the few authentic ones in this area.
After lunch, take a break (and possibly avoid the midday heat) by having a rest back at your hotel. Our Day 1 itinerary resumes a little later in the afternoon…
4. Hoan Kiem Lake – Late afternoon
The de facto city centre and maybe its prettiest spot, Hoan Kiem is totally emblematic of Hanoi. The walkway around the lake is shaded, so it’s comfortable for a leisurely stroll, even before sunset. There are lots of benches and street food/drink sellers near the lake, so feel free to take a load off.
Even though the lake is right next to the Old Quarter, it’s a local hotspot. So, while you’re there, do some people watching to absorb some of the community fabric of Hanoi.
5. French Quarter – ~50 min, toward dinner
This 50 minute walk will take you towards your dinner stop, Vien Dining.
One of my favourite things about Hanoi is how dramatically the city changes character from neighbourhood to neighbourhood in the city centre, even though it’s very compact compared to any other Southeast Asian megacity.
So when you head south from Hoan Kiem, the vibe around you starts to change quickly as the chaotic mish-mash of urban energy gives way to tree-lined avenues organised into neat grids and flanked by pretty French colonial buildings.
For the most part, the route you take on your walk is up to you as long as you end up at Run=Fun. Check out streets you think seem cool or charming. The one stop along the way you shouldn’t miss is the Hanoi Opera House, which has an ornate Parisian-style exterior.
Don’t mistake it for Ho Guom Opera House, another opera house in the French Quarter that doesn’t have nearly the same majesty in its exterior.
6. Run=Fun – Dinner
The oddly-named Run=Fun is a great crash course in contemporary Vietnamese cuisine because it has a huge menu of distinctly Hanoian dishes from grilled pigeon to pork grilled in fish sauce to river trout wrapped in banana leaf. The presentation is also really colourful and creative, something you won’t find elsewhere in Vietnam outside Hanoi.
At about $15/entree, this is by far the most expensive food spot on this itinerary. For the food quality and atmosphere, though, it’s more than worth it.
7. Bay Mau Lake walk – Evening
I find the walk around Bay Mau Lake to be the coolest lakeside in Hanoi. It’s nowhere near as touristy as Hoan Kiem, so the lush greenery along the wide stone walkway surrounding it has a slightly wilder feel.
You’ll have the chance to observe a lot of local life: runners, families, dance groups, older people exercising, couples walking hand-in-hand, and groups of friends sitting by the water with snacks and drinks. Compared with Hoàn Kiếm, the atmosphere feels less sanitised and more “real Hanoi”.
Day 2: museums and arts (the deep dive)
Now that you’ve got most of Hanoi’s iconic sights out of the way, let’s get down to the good stuff: hidden gem activities most guides won’t tell you about, but that capture the spirit of the city and what makes its culture so special. Today’s itinerary will focus on museums and arts.
1. Phu Doan Eel Noodles (or Banh Mi Pho next door) – Breakfast
Stir-fried glass noodles with eel is my favourite Northern Vietnamese dish. I know eel might seem like a bit much to some, but I assure you it doesn’t have a strong taste, even to those who generally don’t like seafood.
Squeeze a bit of lime on it and… my mouth is watering just thinking about it. Phu Doan does the dish well.
If you really want something more familiar, Banh Mi Pho, a few doors down, serves (can you believe it?) banh mi and pho.
Next: Walk to Thang Long Citadel, ~20 min
2. Thang Long Citadel
This is the first stop on this morning’s three-part art tour of pre-colonial, colonial, and contemporary Hanoi.
Thang Long (which means “ascending dragon” and was the old name for Hanoi) served as the political centre of northern Vietnam through multiple dynasties.
Today, it’s a huge complex of mini-museums interspersed with ornate dynastic architecture, well-manicured flower gardens, ruined foundations, excavation sites, and yellow and red lanterns that are pretty both day and night. The one negative is that the information panels are pretty boring, but the sights speak for themselves at Thang Long.
It’s well-worth the $4 ticket fee paid at the door.
Next: Walk to Ba Dinh Park, ~15 min
3. Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum Complex Walk
From Ba Dinh Park, walk around the huge stone square and the rest of the complex nearby. It’s a treasure trove of buildings and art pieces from revolutionary Vietnam, the country’s transition to a sovereign nation.
I’m not actually recommending waiting in line to view Ho Chi Minh’s preserved body unless that’s personally meaningful to you. It is a pilgrimage site for many Vietnamese so observing the people in line can be interesting, but it usually takes an hour to get into the viewing chamber and it’s often underwhelming for tourists.
Instead, spend your time seeing sights like:
- Ba Dình Square and all the Soviet-style facades surrounding it.
- The stilt house where Ho Chi Minh lived and the nice park it’s in.
- One Pillar Pagoda, a birdhouse-like pagoda in the middle of a reflecting pond.
4. Manzil Art Space and Cafe
Today, Hanoi’s arts scene is hands-down the strongest in Vietnam, and Manzil Art Space is arguably the top gathering place for cutting-edge artistic minds in Hanoi.
It’s part gallery, part cafe, and part cultural gathering space, and it’s also a tragically overlooked place for locals and travellers to admire a rotating lineup of exhibits in a relaxing atmosphere.
Browse the art and sit with a coffee while soaking in some sweet, sweet AC – probably a relief after spending the morning outside.
Museum admission is free.
Next: Walk to Bun Ca Huong Thuy for lunch, ~5 min.
5. Bun Ca Huong Thuy – Lunch
Bun Ca Huong Thuy serves vermicelli in broth with Vietnamese fish cakes, fried fish, and herbs. Again, it’s a very Hanoian dish and a very authentic method of preparation.
Next: Rest at the hotel. Make sure to walk down Phung Hung Mural Street on the way back to the hotel to see some of modern Hanoi’s local art in a less curated setting.
6. Vietnamese Women’s Museum
One significant factor in Vietnamese history that is different than most Western cultures is that Vietnam traditionally has strong female social participation, and they often have more influence on the cultural zeitgeist than men.
The centrally-located Women’s Museum is a well-orchestrated walk through the evolving roles of women in Vietnam’s history, especially in regards to family structures and gender norms. It’s a nice capper to the crash course in Vietnam’s aesthetic evolution that you went through earlier.
Museum admission is $1.50, and the audio guide (not crucial but very informative) is another $1.50.
Next: Get a Grab to 371 Kim Ma to catch the next workshop.
7. Calligraphy workshop
Calligraphy is still seen as the highest form of traditional art in Vietnamese society. So learning to do it yourself is extremely immersive.
This workshop is very good at teaching the basics and equipping you to produce something surprisingly good in just two hours.
The teacher, Thanh, does a good job providing context about calligraphy’s role in Vietnamese history and then guiding students through the art itself, which felt almost meditative.
I’m far from an artist and thought I’d end up with something on par with a kindergarten art project, but I actually managed to make something that looked like it was done by a semi-professional and that made a really nice souvenir with a distinctly Vietnamese feel.
Reserve your calligraphy workshop spot
Next: Grab to 42H Ly Thuong Kiet
8. Banh Da Ly Thuong Kiet or Pho Chien Phong – Dinner
Bánh Đa is a dish with flat brown rice noodles floating in broth and mixed with fish cake, herbs, fried shallots, and rice noodles. It’s flavourful and delicious.
Banh Da Ly Thuong Kiet does the dish particularly well and also serves bún mắm, another noodle dish with meats, vegetables, and an incredibly pungent southern-style broth that makes it my choice for best Vietnamese dish.
Vietnamese food is incredible, but I sympathise if you’re tiring of broth-and-noodle dishes. So you may want to go a few doors down to Pho Chien Phong, where they serve a deep-fried variant of pho with no broth.
9. Hanoi Book Street
A few minutes walking will take you to the book street on 19/12 Street.
The book street is a pedestrian-only lane lined with bookstores selling both Vietnamese and English books, cafes, and outdoor reading nooks with soft lighting. It’s a quaint, comfortable setting, but what makes it a great capper for this day focused on Hanoi’s more learned side is the people.
Students studying in the reading nooks, families browsing the shelves, groups of friends sitting around and talking, office workers winding down with an evening stroll… all types of Hanoians make this place come alive and give it an intellectual feel.
Day 3: food and nature (the active day)
1. Ngo Sy Lien Market – Breakfast
Ngo Sy Lien Market is one of the only truly authentic wet markets near the Old Quarter. It has a food court with tons of breakfast options, and it will be buzzing with life at 7:30.
My top recommendation for breakfast at Ngo Sy Lien is xôi, or sticky rice with savoury toppings. But you’ve been in Hanoi long enough now to get a lay of the culinary landscape, so exactly what you get is up to you!
2. Explore the Market
I always say wet markets (named as such because they’re hosed down twice a day) are the purest embodiment of Southeast Asian urban culture, and that’s why exploring an authentic one like Ngo Sy Lien is an indispensable immersion experience.
Ngo Sy Lien is not a flashy, tourist-focused market, and it mainly sells domestic goods like clothes or fresh produce. It’s such a lively and local atmosphere for you to bask in, though. If you would rather have an “objective” there, try searching for and learning the Vietnamese names for these items:
- Live chickens
- Lettuce
- Fresh pineapple
- Coffee beans
- Fresh rice noodles
This may be a good place to buy souvenirs or gifts. Keep in mind, though, that you’re not supposed to bring unpackaged perishable goods through customs.
Choose your afternoon: cooking class or cycling + West Lake
If you’re loving exploring Hanoi and seeing more of the city, go for the botanical gardens + city cycling option.
If you’re more interested in exploring Hanoi’s cuisine, go for the cooking class.
This choice might also be dependent on the temperature when you’re visiting. The 2.5-hour city walk might be too much if you’re visiting in hotter months.
Option 1 – Cooking class
Taxi to Pho Co Ha Noi, ~15 min
This cooking class teaches classic Vietnamese recipes: beef pho, cha gio, and crispy deep-fried spring rolls. The teacher, Tien, is very kind, and the workshop includes what I think are the three requirements for a great travel cooking class:
- A lead teacher who speaks English fluently.
- A guided market visit to source ingredients.
- A well-equipped and air-conditioned prep space.
My favourite part about travel cooking classes like this one is that they give you a cookbook to take home so you can recreate the food over and over again. It’s a souvenir that keeps on giving, which I think is the best kind of keepsake from a holiday.
If you choose this option, take a taxi to Tay An Tra once you’re done with the class and resume the itinerary.
Option 2 – Botanical Gardens, Cycling, Tran Quoc Pagoda
Taxi to Bach Thao Park, ~10 min
1. Botanical Gardens
While this botanical garden isn’t as varied or well-organised as the ones in Singapore or Tokyo, it’s still a gorgeous green space to walk around.
Sitting by the lake and watching the locals of all ages lounging or exercising is fun and a good way to wind down from the market before the bike ride ahead.
The only bummer about this place is the monkey and pigeon enclosures, which are frankly deplorable. They’re dirty, way too small, and I hope Hanoi does away with them soon.
Taxi to Dịch Vụ Cho Thuê Xe Đạp (5 mins): Show this to your taxi driver – it’s the bicycle rental place where you’ll pick up your ride for the day. $1.50 gets you three hours, which is more than enough for the loop below.
2. West Lake cycling + Tran Quoc Pagoda
After renting a bike, stick to the roads along West Lake (the rental shop is on the lakeside) and head towards Tran Quoc Pagoda.
This part of Hanoi is much less dense and has more of a sleepy, undisturbed feel than the city centre, where you’ve spent most of your time. The roads along the lake are especially nice, with little traffic compared to the centre and lots of lovely cafes.
Tran Quoc is one of the coolest locations for a pagoda I’ve ever come across; there’s a thin strip of road running through the lake and Tran Quoc is built along the causeway. Having water surrounding it gives the red, yellow, and pink pagoda a serene magic you don’t come across often, even in Southeast Asia.
After spending some time at Tran Quoc, get back on your bike and head north towards SALArt, once again sticking to roads along the lake.
The pretty, well-organised streets and urban greenery in this area make it a favourite for expats living in Hanoi, so you’ll notice the number of non-Vietnamese locals there skyrocket when you reach this area of your ride.
Prefer a guided ride? This 2.5-hour e-bike loop covers Vong Thi Pagoda, Vong Thi Communal House, Tay Ho Temple, and Yen Phu Village, and ends with a lotus tea-making workshop. This is a good option if you’d rather have a guide handle navigation and context than piece the route together yourself.
book the e-bike tour
SALArt and Coffee at Tay An Tra – Lunch
It’s not Vietnamese food, but a big salad with meats, cheeses, or whatever toppings you choose at SALArt might just hit the spot after a bike ride.
After eating, head down the street to my personal favourite tea house in Hanoi, Tay An Tra. Take a long rest at Tay An Tra before heading back to Dich Vu Cho Thue Xe Dạp.
Next: Bike back to Dịch Vụ Cho Thuê Xe Đạp, ~35 min, then taxi to Su Quan Roastery, ~20 min.
North Vietnamese Coffee and Liquor Workshop
Coffee has always had a huge influence on Vietnamese culture. While street food gets most of the attention, Vietnam’s cafe culture is absolutely amazing and has produced a ton of great coffee drinks.
So it’s hard to dislike this coffee workshop, in which the host tells you about Vietnam’s coffee history and teaches you to make a few of the signature coffee styles in the traditional Vietnamese way.
The workshop also includes a tasting of a few traditional Vietnamese liquors, one of my favourite types of cultural experience because of how memorable the strong bite of locally brewed spirits is.
Taxi to Ngoc Che Garden, ~25 min.
Ngoc Che Garden – Dinner & tea
Ngoc Che Garden is located on Banana Island, the “green lung” in the heart of Hanoi.
As soon as you cross the bridge just before Ngoc Che, everything immediately feels a lot more rural. Farms and dirt roads are everywhere, and wooden carts or grazing cows aren’t uncommon to see along the roads.
Ngoc Che Garden itself specialises in pizza and spaghetti. Not exactly Vietnamese food, but with a Hanoian twist on a lot of the recipes. The rustic seating is mostly outside, so you can watch the sunset.
Golf or pottery painting – Evening
If travelling in a group, you may want to have some fun at the miniature golf course just down the road. It’s not the best manicured course I’ve been to, but it’s pleasant enough and the natural surroundings are pretty. Cost is $5/person.
If you’re travelling alone or you’re just not a mini golf person, head to HaveU Painting Studio in the area where you ate lunch. They offer walk-in pottery workshops.
Taxi to Kem Ho Tay (25 mins)
Ice Cream at Kem Ho Tay
Vietnamese-style ice cream is a nice wrap-up for this itinerary. Kem Ho Tay is a local hotspot and is another great venue for people watching. The ice cream, which includes a lot of tropical flavours like durian, passionfruit, and coconut, is even better. My personal favourite is the sticky rice ice cream.
There you have it – 3 days filled with sightseeing, immersion, and cuisine. We hope this beat-by-beat itinerary has given you oodles of inspiration for putting together one that’s your own!
Your trip research doesn’t stop here, though. Don’t miss our rundown of the best day trips from Hanoi and the best areas to stay in Hanoi.
From Hanoi, many travellers will make their way to the mountain town of Sapa – and our on-the-ground Sapa guide will help you experience the best of Sapa while avoiding the tourist traps.
Zooming out, Hanoi can also be your starting point for an alternative, off-the-beaten path Vietnam itinerary, covering places that most tourists miss.
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