Hanoi: Jeep City Tour & Red River with Women Drivers

4.99

(266 reviews)

What’s the experience like?

I didn’t expect the city to feel so alive from the back of an old army jeep. The first jolt over the Long Bien Bridge rattled my bones (in a good way) and our driver, Mai, just grinned at me like she knew something I didn’t. The air smelled faintly metallic up there, mixed with river mud and exhaust. We stopped in the middle for a photo — the Red River below was brown and lazy, but somehow beautiful. I tried to take it all in but there was too much: scooters buzzing past, someone selling sticky rice from a basket, Mai pointing out how the bridge survived bombings. She said her grandmother used to walk across it every week for market day.

We zipped through neighborhoods I’d never have found alone — past the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum (looked more serious than I expected), then into these tangled alleys where laundry hung above our heads. At Huu Tiep Lake, a piece of an old American bomber just sat there half-sunk, surrounded by regular houses and kids playing soccer. We met Mr. Thanh, who invited us in for tea; he told stories about growing up during the war but also about his grandkids’ TikTok dances. It felt weirdly intimate to be sitting in his living room drinking bitter green tea while outside Hanoi kept roaring by.

Lunch came at this noisy family place near Train Street — plastic stools, clatter of chopsticks, bowls of pho that tasted richer than any I’d had before. Our guide Li laughed when I tried to say “ca phe trung” (egg coffee) and probably butchered it; she showed me how to stir it so the foam didn’t collapse. The whole thing was warm and sweet and kind of stuck with me after we left.