Perfume Pagoda is located in Huong Son (Perfume mountain) 70 km southwest of Hanoi. Pefume Pagoda is not one temple but a cluster of temples and shrines in the general vicinity of Huong Son. Huong Tich is the main temple built during the reign of Le Chinh Hoa (1680-1705). Other shrines and temples were later built in this area to take advantage of the beautiful scenery in this area.
The Perfume Pagoda is one of the highlights of the Hanoi area. It’s also the most important religious sites in Buddhist Vietnam.
Your centrally-located hotel in Hanoi’s Old Quarter
8:00 A.M Daily
Begin with pickup at your hotel in Hanoi, and travel into the countryside by air-conditioned bus. Enjoy views of rural communities as the city traffic gives way to fields and villages, then disembark at Yen Vi Wharf, where you’ll board a boat on the Yen Vi River. Navigate downstream past rolling green hills and limestone mountains, then return to shore at Duc Wharf. This tour includes round-trip access to the Perfume Pagoda cable car, so you can reach the mountain shrine without climbing the steep, slippery footpath up the mountain. Get high above the river as the cable car approaches the summit, and continue by foot on the light hike to Huong Tich Grotto. Enter the grotto to see Buddhist shrines sheltered by limestone walls, then tour the rest of the Perfume Pagoda, a series of important pilgrimage sites for Vietnamese Buddhists. Pause at a local restaurant for lunch before descending by cable car for the return trip to Hanoi. This tour concludes with drop-off at your hotel.
07:40 – 08:00: Pick up from your hotel and depart for Perfume Pagoda (60 km west of Hanoi). Have a break 20 minutes half way to relax in a very typical Vietnamese traditional handicraft village.
Take a 50 minutes boat ride along the river side to enjoy beautiful landscape of streams and paddy fields. Start hiking up to a unique pagoda inside Huong Tich cave on the mountain summit (2.5km in height). You will have a feeling of entering the holy land of buddhism while experience the breath-taking views of surroundings.
12:30: Go back down and enjoy lunch in a local restaurant nearby. Visit Thien Tru Pagoda. Board the boat back to Duc Dock and return Hanoi.
18:30: Arrive in Hanoi. Get dropped off at your morning places. Tour ends.