Bermuda 3 Day Itinerary

You cannot rent a standard car in Bermuda no matter how much you offer, and that single rule shapes the whole trip. The island caps private vehicles by law, so visitors get scooters, small electric two-seaters like the Twizy, or taxis and the public bus and ferry network, and figuring out which of those suits your three days matters more than any single attraction on this list.

Day 1: Hamilton and the Central Parishes

Land at L.F. Wade International Airport and take a taxi into Hamilton if you are not immediately picking up transport, since taxis run on a fixed government meter rate of about $2.75 per mile and the roughly nine mile run into town costs somewhere around $35 to $45, not the inflated figures you sometimes see quoted online. If you want your own wheels for the three days, book a scooter or an electric Twizy through an outfit like Current Vehicles in Pembroke rather than assuming a rental counter works the way it does everywhere else; standard self-drive cars simply are not offered to tourists here.

Get breakfast in Hamilton, then spend the morning at the Bermuda National Gallery for a quick, well-curated look at the island’s art rather than an exhausting one, and walk past City Hall and the Town Clock in the old downtown grid, which is small enough to cover on foot in under an hour. In the afternoon, the Bermuda Botanical Gardens and the attached Masterworks Museum are worth combining into one stop since admission to the gardens is free and the museum is a short walk inside the grounds. Horseshoe Bay Beach gets crowded by midday with cruise ship passengers when a ship is in port at the Royal Naval Dockyard, so if you want the famous pink sand without the crowd, go either right at opening or push your beach time to the very end of the afternoon. Drive the south shore road through Smith’s, Southampton, and Warwick parishes as the light drops, and stop at Gibbs Hill Lighthouse, which is open daily from 10am to 4pm, not weekdays only as some older guides claim, with a $2.50 climb fee for 185 steps and a view over the whole western end of the island that is worth timing for an hour or so before sunset.

Day 2: St. George’s and the East End

St. George’s is the oldest continuously inhabited English settlement in the New World and earned its UNESCO listing for exactly that reason, and it rewards slow walking more than a checklist of sights. Tucker House Museum and St. Peter’s Church, one of the oldest Anglican churches in continuous use outside the British Isles, are both worth the modest entry fees, and the town square still runs the old stocks-and-pillory reenactment for visitors on some afternoons, a bit of theater that is more fun than it sounds.

Head to the Royal Naval Dockyard for lunch and to visit the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum and Zoo if you have not had enough marine life yet, though if a cruise ship is docked expect the Dockyard itself to feel considerably busier than St. George’s did that morning. In the afternoon, Warwick Long Bay and Jobson’s Cove are quieter alternatives to Horseshoe Bay if you already hit the main beach on Day 1, and snorkel gear rents cheaply from stands near most south shore beaches. If you have time, the ferry across to St. David’s Island reaches Tobacco Bay, one of the better snorkeling spots on the island thanks to its rock formations breaking up the surf, though it does charge a small beach access fee in peak season that the free public beaches do not.

Day 3: Somerset and the West End

Somerset Village is the low-key alternative to Hamilton, with fewer shops but a genuinely pleasant, unhurried waterfront feel, and it is the right base for a morning if you want a slower final day before flying out. Crystal Caves in Hamilton Parish, not Somerset itself, is the standout stop of the day: the combination ticket covering both Crystal Cave and the neighboring Fantasy Cave runs $35 for adults and $12 for children 12 and under, and booking ahead is worth it since tour slots run on a timed schedule rather than continuous walk-in access. The underground lake inside is genuinely striking, still connected to the ocean by tidal flow, and the stalactite formations took millions of years to form, a detail that tends to land better with kids than any amount of talking about coral reefs.

Church Bay, on the south shore near the caves, has some of the best shore snorkeling on the island thanks to a reef close enough to reach without a boat, and it draws far fewer people than Horseshoe Bay because it is smaller and less signposted. Round out the afternoon with Tom Moore’s Jungle, a nature reserve with limestone sinkholes and mangrove-lined trails that takes maybe forty minutes to walk and feels like a different island entirely from the beaches. For your last dinner, order a proper fish chowder finished with black rum and sherry peppers stirred in at the table, which is the correct way to drink it here regardless of what the bottle on the table implies about optional garnish.

US, Canadian, UK, and most EU passport holders do not need a visa for stays under six months, but everyone should confirm current requirements before flying since Bermuda’s immigration rules for other nationalities do shift. Pack for genuinely warm, humid weather most of the year and bring reef-safe sunscreen, since several beaches have started asking visitors not to use the oxybenzone-heavy formulas that damage the surrounding reef systems the island’s tourism depends on.