Things to Do in The Hague, Netherlands: One Day Itinerary

Spend the morning walking the old centre between the Binnenhof and the Peace Palace, and the afternoon at Scheveningen beach, and you have covered what most people come to The Hague for in a single day. That is the route below, walked in that order, with the shopping streets, the museums, the pier and the places we ate at along the way.

I had wanted to visit The Hague for years and finally went for a friend’s birthday weekend. We arrived on the Friday afternoon and left on the Sunday to see a museum outside the city, so we had one full day plus the edges of two others. That is enough for the outdoor sightseeing. Stretch the same route over two or three days if you also want to shop properly, sit on the beach or go inside the museums.

One thing to know before you plan: the Binnenhof, the parliament complex at the heart of the old centre, is closed. The renovation started in 2021 and the government now expects the public to be able to walk across the courtyard again in the summer of 2031, with the cost run up past €2.7 billion ($2.9 bn, £2.3 bn). You can still see the buildings from the Hofvijver pond and the Plein, and there is a free information centre about the works, but guides written before 2021 still send readers inside a site they cannot enter.

Prefer someone else to do the navigating? See the highlights on this bike tour, which is how most Dutch people would cover this distance, or take this private walking tour if you would rather stay on foot.

Fun things to do in The Hague

The fun things to do in The Hague split neatly into a morning in the historic centre and an afternoon on the coast, and the two halves are about an hour apart on foot. Listed below are the two parts of the day and what each one covers.

• Morning: the city centre. The old shopping lanes, the Passage arcade, the Hofvijver and the Plein, Noordeinde Palace, Panorama Mesdag and the Peace Palace.
• Afternoon: Scheveningen. The walk out through Oud Scheveningen, the beach promenade, the Palace Promenade mall and the pier.

Wander around The Hague city center

Start the day in the small shopping lanes north-west of the Grote Markt, because they open earlier than the museums and they are the prettiest part of the centre. The streets to walk are the Papestraat, the Oude Molstraat, the Molenstraat and the Prinsestraat, all of them narrow, low-rise and full of independent shops. Add the Passage, the covered shopping arcade off the Spuistraat: part of it is a modern extension and forgettable, and the 19th-century half, which you will recognise instantly, opened in 1885 and is the oldest shopping arcade still trading in the Netherlands.

Walk east from there to the historic core around the Hofvijver. The Mauritshuis, the small gold-standard picture gallery holding Vermeer’s “Girl with a Pearl Earring” and Fabritius’s “The Goldfinch”, sits on the corner of the pond and is open as normal. The Binnenhof behind it is fenced off for the renovation, so the view is from the outside only, and the Plein next door is where the cafe terraces are.

Stand on the corner of the Plein and look across at the historic square with the towers of the Central Station district behind it. That contrast, 13th-century brick against glass and steel, is the single most The Hague thing you will see all day. When we were there the square had been taken over for an event and a row of blue portable toilets was standing in the middle of it, which tells you something about how the city treats its own monuments.

Walk north to the Peace Palace

Head north up the Noordeinde from the centre, because that is the direct line from the old town to the Peace Palace and it takes in two more sights on the way. Noordeinde Palace is the king’s working palace and opens to the public only a handful of days a year, so you see the front and the gates rather than the inside. Behind it, the Palace Garden is a small public park you can enter from the Prinsessewal at the back.

Cross the Hogewal onto the Zeestraat for Panorama Mesdag. The museum is built around Hendrik Willem Mesdag’s panoramic painting of Scheveningen as it looked in 1881, a canvas 14 m tall and 120 m round that you view from a viewing platform in the middle, and it is the oldest panorama of its kind still in its original position. It is a strange, quiet, twenty-minute experience and it is worth the ticket.

The Communication Museum, COMM, used to stand further down the same street. It closed for good in the summer of 2024 after 95 years of postal and telecom history, so if you find it in an older guide, do not walk down there expecting it to be open. What you will see instead on this stretch is embassies, one after another, because this is the diplomatic quarter.

Visit the Peace Palace

The Peace Palace stands at the end of the Zeestraat at Carnegieplein 2, and it houses the International Court of Justice and the Permanent Court of Arbitration. The Visitors Centre in the entrance building is free, open Wednesday to Sunday from midday to 5 p.m., and it runs a self-guided audio tour of about 30 minutes in ten languages, with children’s versions.

Getting inside the palace itself needs a guided tour booked in advance, because unaccompanied visits are not allowed. There are separate tours of the interior, the exterior and the gardens, and the schedule is only published about two weeks ahead, because it depends on whether the court is sitting. Book as soon as your dates are fixed if the inside matters to you.

We covered everything above in one morning and stayed outdoors the whole time. If you want to shop properly, add a day; if you want to go inside the Mauritshuis, Panorama Mesdag and Escher in Het Paleis, add another half-day to a day on top.

An afternoon at Scheveningen beach

Walk to Scheveningen rather than taking the tram, because it takes about an hour from the centre and public transport barely beats it. The route is straight up the Scheveningseweg, which has walking and cycle lanes separated from the traffic the whole way, and it runs through woodland for a good part of it. Do not underestimate the hour, though: an hour out means an hour back, or a tram home.

Keep going straight through Oud Scheveningen and along the Keizerstraat to reach the seafront. The Keizerstraat is the old village’s main street and it is more functional than charming, so treat it as the route rather than a stop. We got a Sinterklaas parade coming the other way and saw almost none of it.

Scheveningen beach is wide, long and backed by a promenade on two levels, one at beach height and one at street height. Walk north along it past the Museum Beelden aan Zee, the sculpture museum built into the dunes, and the Grand Hotel Amrâth Kurhaus, a seafront grand hotel whose origins go back to 1818 and whose Kurzaal concert hall is worth stepping into even if you are not staying. Sea Life Scheveningen on the same stretch is shut for a major refurbishment and is expected back in the second half of 2026.

At the far end is the Palace Promenade, a covered shopping centre. As a mall it was not our thing, and we went in anyway for the arcade and the mirror maze, which has more than 100 mirrors set in arches built from ship timber. It is a good few minutes of fun rather than an attraction, so go in with childlike excitement, as we did, and do not expect more.

Walk out on the Scheveningen pier

The pier is the reason to come to Scheveningen even in bad weather, and it runs about 300 m out over the North Sea with two decks to walk. Entry is free and it is open all year. On the top deck you can walk right to the far end for the view back at the Ferris wheel, which turns 50 m above the water, and at the bungee tower and the zip line next to it. There is a pancake restaurant, a floating spa centre and an event space out there too.

My favourite part was the lower deck. You walk into the pier rather than on top of it, and inside there are food stands, small shops and a playground, with parties and events at weekends. It is sheltered, which on a Dutch coast in winter is the whole argument.

Stay longer if you come in summer. The beach bars along the promenade are open, the Oostduinpark behind the dunes is a good walk, and the sunset from the pier costs nothing at all. It was too cold for any of that when we went, so after a few hours we headed back into the centre.

Where to eat in The Hague

Eat in the centre, because The Hague packs an unusual number of independent cafes into the streets between the Prinsestraat and the Grote Markt and you are rarely more than a minute from one. The city’s food is international rather than Dutch, and the coffee places are genuinely good.

I had asked my followers on Instagram for restaurant recommendations before we went and then ignored the list, because we ate wherever we happened to be when we got hungry. These are the places we ended up in, all of them re-checked and still trading.

1. DUDOK

DUDOK is a Dutch grand-cafe chain with a branch in The Hague, and its apple pie is the reason to go. I had walked past the Rotterdam original many times without going in, and it took someone posting a photograph of the pie on Instagram to get me through the door of this one. My friend and I went in the evening for dessert and had no trouble finding a table, though plenty of them were reserved.

We both ordered the warm apple pie with cinnamon ice cream and whipped cream, and it was very good and very large. Treat it as a late-night treat rather than something to have straight after a meal. The room is broken up into smaller compartments, with a communal table of newspapers and magazines, and the mix of people working, chatting and eating dinner made it feel relaxed rather than rushed.

2. Ohana Poke & More

Ohana Poke & More is a poke and sushi bar at Prinsestraat 18, and it is the place to go when you want something light after a day of pastry. You can order one of the house bowls or build your own from scratch, and each comes in a regular or a large size. We both had a regular and agreed it was the right amount.

The counter does takeaway as well as eat-in, and it opens through the middle of the day into the evening, seven days a week, which makes it useful for the awkward hours between lunch and dinner. Ohana now has branches in Rotterdam and at the Mall of the Netherlands too.

3. ‘t Goude Hooft

‘T Goude Hooft is a grand cafe and hotel at Dagelijkse Groenmarkt 13, and the building is a sight in its own right: a tall stepped-gable hall on the old market square, open from breakfast until midnight. We went for our second dinner because the menu had a bit of everything, which felt like a safe choice.

It was fine rather than memorable. The service was friendly but slow, my chicken was very good and the promised homemade applesauce turned out to be a spoonful of it, and the fries were overcooked. There was also a live singer working the room between the tables during a birthday party, which did not match the classy lounge decor at all. Go for the building and the terrace on the Groenmarkt, and set your expectations of the food accordingly.

4. Burrata

Burrata is a slow-food Italian restaurant at Turfmarkt 87, near the Central Station, and it was the meal of the trip I would repeat. We went there first, on the Friday we arrived, purely because it was close to the hotel and we were hungry, which is usually how you end up with a bad dinner rather than a good one.

The staff were friendly, the pizzas come out of a stone oven, and we had a table by the window slightly tucked away from the rest of the room, which meant we could talk without hearing everyone else. There is a long Italian wine list, and the kitchen also does antipasti and seafood. I would go back.

5. MingleMush

MingleMush is a food hall at Anna van Buerenplein 712, right beside The Hague Central Station, and it was the first of its kind in the city. We went in after dinner just to look around, and what I liked was how little it felt like a food court. The stands are scattered across the 1,600 m² hall rather than lined up in rows, with picnic tables and other seating in between them and an arcade up the stairs.

Fifteen stands trade here, covering Lebanese, Mexican, Dutch, Polish, Indonesian, Kenyan, Surinamese and Thai food, poke and burgers, and a large bar runs down the middle. Some counters serve you at the table and at others you fetch your own. Almost everything is quick and casual, which makes this the answer to a late arrival or an early train, and the terrace on the Anna van Buerenplein seats more than 300 people in summer.

Two places from older Hague guides that have closed

Two cafes that used to be on this list are gone, and other guides still list both. Lunchroom Confetti at Prinsestraat 63, the one with the pile of jumpers by the door for cold customers, has closed and its website domain has since been taken over by a spam site. The Communication Museum COMM on the Zeestraat closed permanently in the summer of 2024.

The Hague tours and special entry tickets

Book ahead for the two things in The Hague that genuinely need it: the Peace Palace and Escher in Het Paleis. There is less on offer here than in Amsterdam, but the tours that exist are good and a couple of the attractions sell discounted online entry.

Private tour of The Hague with a local

Take a private tour with a local guide if you want the city introduced around your own interests rather than a fixed route. The tour runs from two to six hours, it is customisable, and it covers where to eat and shop as well as the highlights and how to get around, which is more useful in a working city like this one than a monument-by-monument walk. Book your private tour of The Hague with a local here.

Discounted entrance to Escher in Het Paleis

Escher in Het Paleis holds the permanent M.C. Escher collection inside a former royal palace on the Lange Voorhout, and booking online gets you a discount on the door price. We ran out of time for it, which I regret, because the combination of Escher’s impossible staircases and a real palace hung with 15 crystal chandeliers shaped like sharks, skulls, spiders and seahorses, made for the museum by the Rotterdam artist Hans van Bentem, is a very odd and very Dutch pairing. Book your discounted ticket here.

How to get to The Hague

Take the train to Den Haag Centraal, because The Hague sits on the main line and every route into the city ends there anyway. From Amsterdam Schiphol and from Amsterdam Centraal there are direct trains, and the journey takes about half an hour on the Intercity and around 50 minutes on the slower Sprinter. Den Haag HS is the city’s second station and is also central.

Fly into Amsterdam Schiphol if you are coming from outside the Netherlands, because Rotterdam The Hague Airport is small and serves few routes. Compare flights into the Netherlands before you fix your dates, and long-distance buses if you are coming overland from Belgium, Germany or France on a budget.

Driving is the least convenient option, because the centre is full of one-way streets and paid parking. There are several underground car parks around the centre, including Parking Turfmarkt beside the station, and they all charge by the hour with a daily maximum; check the operator’s current tariff rather than an older guide’s, because the rates have gone up. The other option is a park-and-ride on the edge of the city with a tram in.

Rotterdam is 25 minutes down the same line, so the two cities pair easily. Our guide to what to do in Rotterdam in a weekend covers the other end of that trip.

Where to stay in The Hague

Stay between Den Haag Centraal and the Grote Markt, because that puts the old centre, the shopping streets and the tram to Scheveningen all within about ten minutes on foot. The Hague’s centre is small, and the walk from the station to the Mauritshuis is under fifteen minutes.

We stayed at Spui 180, in the four-star hotel that traded then as the Mercure Den Haag Central, as guests of the Accor group. The location was the strong point: a few minutes from the station, the shopping streets and the historic quarter, with private parking nearby. The room was a twin with a flatscreen television, a desk, plenty of cupboard space and a modern bathroom, the wifi was free and fast, and the breakfast buffet, which cost extra, was the most generous part of the stay, with local, organic and gluten-free products, several breads, eggs, granola, seeds, fruit, yoghurt and fresh orange juice.

The hotel has since been overhauled and reopened in December 2025 under a different Accor brand, as the TRIBE Hotel Den Haag Centraal, with new furniture and fittings throughout and a restaurant called HitchHike. That means the rooms I stayed in no longer exist as I described them, though the location and the friendly front desk, which stored our bags after checkout so we could take a last walk, are the same building. Check prices and availability at the hotel on Spui 180 for your dates.

Scheveningen is the other place to consider, if you would rather wake up by the sea and take the tram in. It costs less outside July and August and it puts the beach and the pier on your doorstep. A wider Netherlands hotel search will show what is free in both areas, and our list of Rotterdam cafes and foodie hot spots is worth a look if you are pairing the two cities.

WonderfulWanderings Pro Tips

The 5 tips below come from our own weekend here and from re-checking every building and venue on this page in 2026, because The Hague has closed or rebranded more of them than a city this size usually does.

1. Do not plan to walk through the Binnenhof. It has been closed to the public since 2021 and the renovation now runs to summer 2031, so every pre-2021 guide is sending readers into a building site. You can still see the buildings and the Hofvijver from outside, which is where the photograph comes from anyway.
2. Walk to Scheveningen rather than waiting for a tram, and count the hour twice. The route straight up the Scheveningseweg took us about an hour, with walking and cycle lanes separated from the traffic the whole way, and public transport barely beats it. An hour out is an hour back, so decide before you set off whether you are riding home.
3. Book the Peace Palace interior as soon as your dates are fixed. Unaccompanied visits are not allowed and the tour schedule appears only about 2 weeks ahead, because it depends on whether the court is sitting. The Visitors Centre next door is free, opens Wednesday to Sunday from midday to 5 p.m. and runs a 30-minute audio tour in ten languages.
4. Cross two names off any older Hague list. COMM, the communication museum on the Zeestraat, closed for good on 1 July 2024 after 95 years, and Sea Life Scheveningen is shut for a refurbishment expected to finish in the second half of 2026.
5. Book Spui 180 by its current name. The four-star hotel we stayed in reopened in December 2025 as the TRIBE Hotel Den Haag Centraal after being stripped back and refitted, so a room described in a Mercure review no longer exists even though the building and the front desk do.

About the author. This guide is written and maintained by the Wonderful Wanderings editorial team. Wonderful Wanderings was founded in 2012 by Sofie Couwenbergh, and the first-hand notes in this post come from her weekend in The Hague and Scheveningen. The team covers the Netherlands for independent travellers, including the walking routes, museums, tours, restaurants and hotels worth booking in The Hague, and re-checks every place on this page before each update, dropping the ones that have closed.