The best things to do in Can Tho are Cai Rang floating market at dawn, the quieter Phong Dien market upriver, the 1870 Binh Thuy ancient house, Ong Pagoda on the waterfront and an evening on Ninh Kieu wharf. Give it two days: one on the river from 5am, one for the temples, the old market and banh xeo.
Can Tho is the Mekong Delta's working capital, a city built where the Can Tho River meets the Hau. Its markets still float, its noodles are still cut by hand, and its best hours start at five in the morning on a boat. Since its 2025 merger with Hau Giang and Soc Trang, it reaches from the Hau to the sea.
The largest floating market in the delta and still a wholesale one: each boat hangs what it sells from a tall pole and buyers pull alongside. It peaks from about 5:30 to 7am, half an hour by boat from Ninh Kieu wharf.
The city's front room, a riverside park where the Can Tho River joins the Hau, with the boat pier, the old market and the footbridge. Come at dusk, when families take the promenade and the bridge lights come on.
Built by the Duong family in 1870 and still lived in by their descendants: a French facade over a Vietnamese plan of carved hardwood and ancestral altars. Jean-Jacques Annaud filmed scenes of The Lover here.
Not a pagoda but a Cantonese assembly hall, built from 1894 to 1896 and dedicated to Guan Yu, the deified general. Spiral incense coils hang from the beams and burn for days. It faces the wharf, five minutes from the river.
Smaller than Cai Rang and far less visited, with more hand-rowed boats than motor ones. It is mostly over by 7am. Go by road, about 17 km from the centre; the boat from town is long.
The largest Zen monastery in the delta, built in under a year and inaugurated in May 2014 on about four hectares of grounds. The northern Truc Lam style looks unlike anything else here, and the gardens are calm after the market.
A Khmer Theravada temple from the 1940s on the city's main avenue, with tiered, curving roofs and carvings from Khmer myth. It is the centre of Can Tho's Khmer community and a good primer before Soc Trang.
A 199-metre S-curved footbridge that opened in February 2016, linking the wharf to Cai Khe. Unremarkable by day; after dark its lights make it the city's evening walk and the best view back over the river.
A family workshop that makes hu tieu the old way: rice ground to batter, steamed into sheets, dried on bamboo racks in the sun, then cut. It sits a few minutes by boat from Cai Rang, so most market trips stop here.
A village dinh built in 1844 and rebuilt around 1910, listed as a national monument in 1989. Its carved altars and tiled roofs are the reason to come, and the Ky Yen festival fills it twice a year.
Lunar New Year. The floating markets stop for the first days and much of the city shuts.
Khmer New Year in mid-April, kept at Munirangsyaram and across the Soc Trang pagodas.
Hundreds of stalls of southern cakes, timed to the Hung Kings' anniversary.
The communal house's spring rite for the new crop, in the fourth lunar month.
The Buddhist festival of filial piety. Pagodas fill and families wear a rose for their mothers.
Lanterns, lion dances and mooncakes across the city for the full moon.
The Khmer moon festival, with ghe ngo boat races on the Maspero River in Soc Trang.
The communal house's second rite, closing the rice year in the twelfth lunar month.
About 8 km north-west of the centre, 15 to 20 minutes by car. One terminal handles both domestic and international flights.
About 170 km. Buses from Mien Tay station take around four hours to the central bus station on Highway 1 in Cai Rang.
Market boats, sampans and evening cruises leave from the wharf. Agree the stops, the hours and the price before you board.
The centre is walkable along the river. Grab, Be and Xanh SM cover everything else, including the airport and Binh Thuy.
A crisp turmeric pancake of pork, shrimp and sprouts, wrapped in mustard greens.
Fermented-fish hotpot, eaten with a basket of delta greens and flowers.
Duck braised with fermented tofu and taro. On Vietnam's 100 delicacies list.
Sticky rice cake dyed purple with magenta leaf, salted egg yolk inside.
A deep-fried cup of rice flour, mung bean and prawn, eaten with herbs.
Grilled pork, rolled in rice paper with green banana and herbs.
Rice noodle soup, with noodles from the workshops around Cai Rang.
Snakehead grilled whole in burning straw, rolled with rice paper.
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