Ho Chi Minh City
To understand the US invasion of Vietnam, and contextualize its devastating impact on the country's civilians, this remarkable and deeply moving museum is…
Must-see attractions in Ho Chi Minh City
Ho Chi Minh City
Built in 1909 in honour of the supreme Taoist god (the Jade Emperor or King of Heaven, Ngoc Hoang), this is one of the most atmospheric temples in Ho Chi…
Ho Chi Minh City
Built between 1877 and 1883, Notre Dame Cathedral enlivens the heart of Ho Chi Minh City's government quarter, facing Ð Dong Khoi. A red-brick, neo…
Ho Chi Minh City
Believed to be the oldest temple in HCMC (1744), Giac Lam is a fantastically atmospheric place set in peaceful, garden-like grounds. The Chinese…
Ho Chi Minh City
Surrounded by royal palm trees, the dissonant 1960s architecture of this landmark government building and the eerie ambience of its deserted halls make it…
Ho Chi Minh City
A grand neoclassical structure built in 1885 and once known as Gia Long Palace (and later the Revolutionary Museum), HCMC’s city museum is a singularly…
Ho Chi Minh City
Delightfully fronted by greenery and opening to an interior blaze of red, gold, green and yellow, this is one of the most beautifully ornamented temples…
Ho Chi Minh City
Cholon’s main market has a great clock tower and a central courtyard with gardens. Much of the business here is wholesale but it’s popular with tour…
Ho Chi Minh City
The city's landmark French-era post office is a period classic, designed by Marie-Alfred Foulhoux (though often credited to Gustave Eiffel) and built…
Ho Chi Minh City
The inner walls of this sanctuary, famed as the repository of a sacred relic of the Buddha, are adorned with paintings depicting the Buddha’s life…
Ho Chi Minh City
Built between 1939 and 1942, this temple is said to be the only pure Taoist temple in Vietnam and is unique for its colourful statues of Taoist disciples…
Ho Chi Minh City
With its airy corridors and verandas, this elegant 1929 colonial-era, yellow-and-white building is stuffed with period details; it is exuberantly tiled…
Ho Chi Minh City
In a land where so many ancient temples have been ‘restored’ in concrete and neon, it’s a joy to discover one that looks its age. The temple has an…
Ho Chi Minh City
Built in 1929, this notable Sino-French museum houses a rewarding collection of artefacts illustrating the evolution of the cultures of Vietnam, from the…
Ho Chi Minh City
Gracing the intersection of Ð Dong Khoi and ÐL Le Loi, this grand colonial edifice with a sweeping staircase was built in 1897 and is one of the city's…
Ho Chi Minh City
One of the city’s most prominent landmarks is home to the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee. Built between 1901 and 1908, the former Hôtel de Ville…
Ho Chi Minh City
This elegant 68-storey, 262m-high Carlos Zapata–designed skyscraper dwarfs all around it. It's reportedly shaped like a lotus bulb, but it also resembles…
Ho Chi Minh City
This museum is dedicated to celebrating the accomplishments of Vietnamese women. The first floor is the most accessible to foreign visitors, with…
Ho Chi Minh City
Housed in a splendidly restored French-colonial mansion – a building that was the home of US Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge from 1963 to 1967 – Salon Saigon…
Ho Chi Minh City
This Fujian temple is dedicated to the Goddess of Seafarers, Thien Hau (Thien Hau Thanh Mau), also known as Ma To. The four carved stone pillars, wrapped…
Museum of Traditional Vietnamese Medicine
Ho Chi Minh City
A lovely piece of traditional architecture in itself, this absorbing and very well-stocked museum with over a dozen exhibition rooms affords fascinating…
Ho Chi Minh City
HCMC's best contemporary art space is in District 2 on the east side of the Saigon River. Interesting exhibitions and showcases of local artists are…
Ho Chi Minh City
This inspiring, independent, nonprofit gallery was founded by artists, giving other local artists the opportunity to display and develop their intriguing…
Ho Chi Minh City
The only surviving structure from the original Norodom Palace (which was bombed in 1962 and replaced with today's Reunification Palace) is this impressive…
Ho Chi Minh City
Built around the turn of the 19th century, this decaying light-caramel-painted church exudes a sleepy, tropical feel. A pew in the church is marked with a…
Ho Chi Minh City
Dedicated to Marshal Le Van Duyet (1763–1831), this shrine is also his burial place, alongside that of his wife. The marshal was a South Vietnamese…
Ho Chi Minh City
Nicknamed the ‘Dragon House’ (Nha Rong), this former customs house was built by the French authorities in 1863. The museum houses many of Ho Chi Minh’s…
Ho Chi Minh City
This gorgeous 19th-century temple is dedicated to the goddess Thien Hau, and always attracts a mix of worshippers and visitors, who mingle beneath the…
Ho Chi Minh City
One of Cholon’s most active and colourful temples, this shrine was founded in the early 19th century. It’s named after the Goddess of Mercy, whose full…
Ho Chi Minh City
Only a small number of Hindus live in HCMC, but this colourful slice of southern India is also considered sacred by many ethnic Vietnamese and Chinese…
Ho Chi Minh City
One of the city's most attractive green spaces is 10-hectare Tao Dan Park, its bench-lined walks shaded with avenues of towering tropical trees, including…
Ho Chi Minh City
A humble noodle-soup restaurant may seem an unusual attraction, but there's more to Pho Binh than meets the eye. This was the secret headquarters of the…
Ho Chi Minh City
Founded in 1946, this Theravada Buddhist pagoda serves the Khmer community in HCMC. The peaceful grounds include living quarters for about 30 monks, a…
Ho Chi Minh City
Built by South Indian Muslims in 1935 on the site of an earlier mosque, lime-green Saigon Central Mosque is an immaculately clean and well-tended island…
Ho Chi Minh City
This small patriotic museum is dedicated to Ton Duc Thang, Ho Chi Minh’s successor as president of Vietnam. Born in 1888 in Long Xuyen in the Mekong Delta…
Ho Chi Minh City
Originally built by the French and destroyed three times, this 19th-century house of worship is one of the city's largest churches, with good views from…
Ho Chi Minh City
Built between 1802 and 1820 on the site of structures from the Funan period, dating back at least to the early centuries of Christianity, this Buddhist…
Ho Chi Minh City
Saigon’s District 7 is a sleek, fashionable and well-designed retreat for the wealthy within the fringes of the city. Businesspeople, both expats and the…
Ho Chi Minh City
Noteworthy for its gilded woodwork, this temple has a large carved wooden boat hanging over its entrance and inside, to the left of the doorway, an…
Ho Chi Minh City
Retaining much of its original rich ornamentation, this 19th-century temple – a guildhall named after Sanshan (Three Mountains) in China's seaboard Fujian…