3 Days of Hanoi like a Local |

Explore Hanoi’s Highlights & Hidden Gems

    Days
    3
  
    Start
    Hanoi
  
    End
    Hanoi
  
    Group Size
    Private
  
    Best Time
    Spring & Autumn
  
    Age
    11+
  
    Category
    Private Boutique*

Overview

Dive into Hanoi, tasting world-class street food, finding hidden local gems and the capital's highlights, all from a unique, local perspective.

You’ll discover the intensity and energy that swirls through this culturally rich city, as you soak in all the sights, sounds and smells crash around the city. You’ll take in thousand-year-old traditions at water puppet shows, eat your way through the atmospheric Old Quarter, and experience the full chaos of Hanoi traffic in a traditional cyclo.

Understand the history and the culture of the city as you get a feel for it, helping you dig beneath the surface and learn what really makes Hanoi tick. Your guide will use their local knowledge to show you the best spots, completely unknown to tourists, as you sit in trackside bars in the Old Town, sipping a cold beer with the locals as trains go rattling through the very busy streets.

Accommodation will be in a boutique hotel such as the L’Heritage Hotel, where luxurious rooms combined with the charming, atmospheric location in the Old Town make a wonderful place to call home on your stay in Hanoi.

Private/Boutique*: Boutique accommodation, private tour guide

Hanoi City 3 Day Private Itinerary

Day 1
Welcome to Hanoi
Arrive in Hanoi, and your guide will meet you and take you to your accommodation for the next two nights in the atmospheric streets of the Old Quarter.
Relax, recover from whatever journey you’ve taken to get here, then we recommend you use any spare time you have to go and soak up the bustle of Hanoi’s 36 Streets area, or the Old Quarter.
In the evening, you’ll be taken to sit down at a traditional water puppet performance. This northern tradition is thought to date back around one thousand years, and is performed to the sound of traditional Vietnamese music that makes use of bamboo flutes, drums, wooden bells and horns.
After this essential cultural experience, you’ll head back to your accommodation to get ready for a full day of exploring.

Hanoi Like a Local
Today, you’ll be exploring Hanoi and all the madness, the sights, smells, tastes, the rushing crowds and traffic and the little oases of calm by foot.
Although the traffic is pretty intense, exploring from ground level is by far the best way of seeing this fascinating city, and by the end of your adventure through the colourful, buzzing streets, you’ll have a real feel for Hanoi.
Start with the elegant Ngoc Son Temple, the gem in the middle of Hoan Kiem Lake, and get local insight into Vietnamese culture and religion from your local guide.
Then, after the relative calm and spirituality of the temple, head for streets and experience the organised, and not so organised, chaos of the streets on a cyclo, and become part of the tsunami of scooters and bikes that flood the roads.
Later, you’ll stroll back to the Old Quarter, stopping along the famous train tracks in a little spot only the locals know and use, to sample the Hanoi institution ‘Bia Hoi’.
A wonderfully fresh beer, brewed and served up by the friendliest locals you could hope to meet, a glass sets you back around 25 American cents.
While away the hours in the convivial atmosphere, sipping cold, refreshing beers and eating incredible street food as the trains go rattling through the peeling, colourful streets.
Meals: Breakfast and lunch
On to Your Next Adventure
The tour comes to an end this morning, and we’ll bid you a fond farewell from Hanoi.
If you are spending more time in the city or in Vietnam, we are more than happy to help you book your next accommodation or onward travel.
Meals: Breakfast