Three Days in Hanoi - Access Hanoi

A traditional stilt dwelling reconstructed in the museum's outdoor collection — Photograph by Richard Mortel from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0

The third day is the one most people skip, and it is the one they should not: the museum seven kilometres west, and the lakes north of the city at the end of the day.

⭐ If you see one museum in Hanoi, see the Museum of Ethnology. It is widely reckoned the best in Vietnam and it is missed almost entirely because it needs a car in each direction.

The plan

Days 1–2 — As above.
Day 3, 09:00 — ⭐ The Museum of Ethnology, in Cầu Giấy, about twenty minutes by car from the Old Quarter. Fifty-four ethnic groups indoors, and outdoors a garden of full-size houses built by the communities they belong to — a Bahnar communal house with a roof nearly twenty metres high, an Ede longhouse you climb into. ⚠️ Closed one day a week; confirm before you cross the city.
12:30 — Back east, and lunch on the way.
14:30 — The things day one ran out of time for: Hàng Mã and the tinsmiths on Hàng Thiếc, or the restored merchant’s house at 87 Mã Mây, which is the easiest way to see the full depth of a tube house.
16:30 — North to West Lake. Walk Thanh Niên end to end — Quán Thánh Temple at the south, Tran Quoc Pagoda on its causeway at the north, water on both sides.
Sunset — ⭐ The eleven-tier stupa at Tran Quoc against the lake is the photograph everybody takes and it earns it. It is also the coolest air in the city on a hot evening.
19:30 — Dinner in Tây Hồ, or back to the Old Quarter if you want the noise.

Truc Bach lake with the buildings of the district along the far shore — Photograph by Rolf Müller ( User:Rolfmueller ), Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0

⚠️ The alternative third day is Ninh Bình — roughly two and a quarter hours each way by train from Ga Hà Nội, karsts rising out of rice fields, and a rowed boat. Take it if you would rather see the country than another museum, but you will lose the museum.

The pagoda seen through palms from the lakeside — Photograph by Richard Mortel from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0

What this plan is built around

Not a list of sights, but the constraints. ⛔ The Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum is mornings only, is traditionally closed on Mondays and Fridays, and shuts altogether for several weeks most years — so it goes first in any day it appears in, or it does not appear at all. ⚠️ The food stalls sell out: breakfast before eight, lunch before one, and a famous bún chả at three in the afternoon is a shutter. ⭐ The Old Quarter core closes to traffic from Friday evening to Sunday night, which is the best evening of the week and the one to keep free. And everything else is walking — twenty-five minutes between clusters at eleven in the morning, an hour at half past five.

Hoan Kiem Lake and the Turtle Tower seen across the open water — Photograph by Jorge Láscar from Australia, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0

Other lengths

2 daysTwo Days in Hanoi 5 daysFive Days in Hanoi A weekA Week in Hanoi

Checked on 7 September 2026. Closing days, dress rules and journey times change — confirm before you travel. All sixteen sights, one page each, in Landmarks & Sights.