Hangzhou 7 Day Itinerary (No Tourist Traps)
Heads up: some links here are affiliate links. Book or buy through them and we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only point you to things we would actually use.
Seven days based in Hangzhou alone is mostly padding, and this itinerary says so plainly rather than inventing a seventh must-see sight that doesn’t exist. It’s the 6-day itinerary , a Suzhou day trip included, plus a second day trip to the Wuzhen and Xitang water towns. If you genuinely have a week in this region, most travelers get more out of spending several of those days actually staying in Shanghai or Suzhou rather than day-tripping to both from a single Hangzhou base; this plan is for anyone who wants to stay Hangzhou-based anyway. Shorter versions, the 4 and 5-day plans, cover the Hangzhou-only core without the day trips.
Book these before you go
- A timed Lingyin Temple + Feilai Feng slot, via the Alipay or WeChat mini-program, 1-7 days ahead, daily caps apply.
- Alipay set up before you fly, with a foreign card linked, and a VPN installed before you leave home.
- Your Suzhou high-speed rail ticket, via 12306 or Trip.com .
- A car or driver for the Wuzhen/Xitang day, since doing both by public bus in a single day is a stretch.
- A West Lake-area hotel, compare rates on Booking.com .
Day 1: West Lake and a Longjing tea village
Walk the free West Lake causeways: the Su Causeway (1074, Su Dongpo) and the Bai Causeway (822, Bai Juyi, a different builder roughly 250 years earlier). Boat to Three Pools Mirroring the Moon (¥55-70). Afternoon in Meijiawu or Longjing tea village, free to wander, tastings ¥10-80 a cup. Close at Leifeng Pagoda (¥40), a 2002 rebuild over the 975 CE original, which collapsed in 1924.
Day 2: Lingyin Temple and Feilai Feng
Free since 1 December 2025, but only with a mandatory timed reservation through the Alipay or WeChat mini-program, booked 1 to 7 days ahead, daily cap in place. Founded 328 CE; Feilai Feng carries 300-plus Buddhist rock carvings, including the well-known laughing Maitreya.
Day 3: Hefang Street and the Grand Canal
Hefang Street (free) for Dongpo Pork and West Lake Vinegar Fish; Louwailou since 1848 for the sit-down version. A Grand Canal night cruise from Gongchen Bridge (around ¥100), a separate UNESCO listing from 2014, distinct from West Lake’s own 2011 designation.
Day 4: Xixi Wetland
An 11 sq km urban marsh, a genuine change of pace from the lake-and-temple circuit. Central zone free; quieter east and west zones around ¥80.
Day 5: The Silk and Tea museums, and the Six Harmonies Pagoda
China National Silk Museum (free, the world’s largest) and China National Tea Museum (free) in the morning. Six Harmonies Pagoda in the afternoon, ¥20 entry plus ¥10 to climb, on the Qiantang River, a separate site south of the lake. This is the end of Hangzhou’s own honest sight list.
Day 6: a day trip to Suzhou
High-speed rail to Suzhou takes about 43 minutes from Hangzhou East. It’s a rushed way to see the classical gardens properly, an overnight suits Suzhou better, but as a single day it’s a genuinely different kind of sight from anything in Hangzhou itself.
Day 7: Wuzhen and Xitang water towns
About 1.5 to 2 hours out by car, these are the famous canal towns with Ming and Qing-era architecture and waterways. Combine both by private car; trying to reach both by public bus in a single day is a real stretch, plan for one if bus is your only option. This is the day that makes a full week defensible: it’s categorically different scenery from the lake, the temple, and the wetland, not a repeat of them.
Know before you fly
China sits at US State Department Level 2, driven mainly by exit-ban and arbitrary-detention risk tied to business or legal disputes, not street crime, which is low; ordinary sightseeing carries very little of it. Day-to-day, the language barrier is the more common friction, a translation app earns its keep, plus the near-cashless Alipay/WeChat Pay system and a Great Firewall that blocks Google, Maps, and WhatsApp, so a VPN installed before you leave home matters more here than in most cities.
Is 7 days too many for Hangzhou?
Yes, if all seven stay inside Hangzhou’s own sight list, which runs a genuine 5 days at its honest length. It’s defensible only when the extra days do something categorically different, which is exactly what days 6 and 7 of this plan are: a different city and a different kind of countryside, not a stretched version of the same lake.
| Day | Focus | Rough cost per person (¥, excl. hotel) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | West Lake causeways, Three Pools boat, tea village, Leifeng Pagoda | 150-200 |
| 2 | Lingyin Temple + Feilai Feng (free, reserved) | 20-40 |
| 3 | Hefang Street, Grand Canal night cruise | 130-180 |
| 4 | Xixi Wetland (central zone free, east/west zones ~¥80) | 0-80 |
| 5 | Silk Museum, Tea Museum (both free), Six Harmonies Pagoda | 30-50 |
| 6 | Suzhou day trip (HSR + gardens) | 150-250 |
| 7 | Wuzhen + Xitang water towns (private car) | 300-500 |
One concrete tip: set up Alipay and install a VPN before you fly, and reserve the Lingyin Temple slot the moment your dates are fixed. Both are five-minute jobs at home and half a lost day if left for arrival.