Hanoi for The Thrill Seekers: a Friday-to-Monday weekend

A 17 km loop around the lake on a rented bike, with the water on one side and temples and street food on the other; be back as it gets dark.

The track runs a metre from the café tables and the train rolls through at close range several times each evening; ask the café which times to expect and stand clear.

Pan-fried beef phở, the garlicky style, with plenty of spring onion on top; eat it on a plastic stool beside the wok.

An hour and a half from the city and a long stepped climb to the temple near the summit through cloud forest; start early to be down before the afternoon haze.

A laterite-stone village of old Vietnamese houses and a communal house of 1684, which you can see on the way home; ride a bicycle between the alleys.

Charcoal-grilled pork patties in a sweet-sour broth with a basket of herbs and vermicelli; the cooks sit on the pavement and fan the grill. A very good sweaty refuel.

Four hundred and ninety-nine steps up the limestone ridge to a dragon-topped peak, where all of Tam Cốc spreads out below; go early, it gets hot and crowded.

A two-and-a-half-hour paddled sampan through limestone caves and paddies; your boatwoman rows with her feet at the back, and the caves are cool.

Fresh beer for a few thousand dong on child-sized stools, with grilled squid and nuts; the traffic stops for nobody, and a sweaty legs-up evening should end here.

Run or walk the 1.7 km iron bridge in the mist, with a barge fleet below and the sellers' bicycles streaming past; it is the best free workout in Hanoi.

The French colonial jail, later the "Hanoi Hilton", with the original guillotine, the cells and the sewers prisoners escaped through; spend an hour and a half.

The grilled pork and noodle lunch that President Obama ate here, and the combo is still cheap; arrive before noon to skip the queue.