Vinh Trang Pagoda

Vinh Trang Pagoda tickets and tours: which one to book

Vinh Trang is a working Buddhist pagoda on the edge of My Tho, the gateway town of the Mekong Delta, and there is no ticket to buy: entry to the grounds and halls is free, with donation boxes inside. Almost every foreign visitor arrives as part of a day trip from Ho Chi Minh City, about 70 km and two hours away by road, and the pagoda is usually the first stop before the boats. Two types of trip are sold online. The first is a private day tour with car, driver and guide, which collects you from your hotel, visits the pagoda and then continues to the river for a boat ride among the islands between My Tho and Ben Tre.

The second is a small-group version of the same day, capped at around a dozen people, which is cheaper and less rushed than the big coach tours. Both normally include transport, guide, boat trips, a fruit tasting and lunch; drinks and tips are extra. The usual delta programme after the pagoda involves a motorboat across the Tien River, a ride in a small rowing boat through the palm-lined canals, a visit to a coconut-candy workshop and some traditional music. If you mainly want time at Vinh Trang itself, a private tour is better, as you can ask the guide to linger. Travellers already in My Tho can reach the pagoda by taxi or motorbike in a few minutes from the riverfront.

Visiting Vinh Trang Pagoda: what to see and how to behave

The pagoda was founded in the middle of the nineteenth century on land given by a local official and completed around 1850. It was badly damaged in the fighting when the French took the south in the 1860s, rebuilt, wrecked again by a storm in 1904 and rebuilt once more, which is why most of what you see dates from the early twentieth century. It occupies about 2 hectares of gardens and orchards beside a canal. The front of the main building is the most striking thing about it: a mix of Vietnamese, Chinese, Khmer and European ideas, with arched colonnades and pillars covered in mosaics of broken porcelain and coloured tiles. The great triple gate at the entrance was built in 1933 by craftsmen brought from Hue, and the tiled decoration on its upper storey rewards a close look. Inside the main hall, dark wooden columns carved with dragons frame the altars.

Look for the bronze statues of Amitabha and his attendant bodhisattva, the oldest images in the pagoda, and the set of eighteen carved wooden arhats, each around 80 cm tall, made by southern craftsmen in 1907. The garden behind holds three huge white statues added in recent decades, a standing Amitabha, a laughing Maitreya and a reclining Buddha, which dwarf the old buildings. Monks still live and study here, so keep voices low and do not walk in front of anyone praying. Shoes come off before the main hall, and photography is usually fine except during ceremonies. The pagoda is on the eastern edge of My Tho, a few minutes by car from the town centre and the boat piers.

Vinh Trang Pagoda: opening hours, ceremonies and the best time to go

The pagoda is open every day from early morning to late afternoon, with a pause around midday when the monks eat and rest; there are no fixed hours posted for visitors, so aim for the morning or mid-afternoon. Day tours from Ho Chi Minh City usually arrive between nine and ten, so the halls are at their quietest before or after that wave. Early morning is cooler and you may hear chanting. The dry season, from December to April, brings the most comfortable weather in the delta;

the rainy season from May to November means short heavy downpours, usually in the afternoon, but the orchards and canals are greener and the fruit is at its best in midsummer. Buddhist festivals bring crowds of worshippers and make for a lively visit: the full moon of the first lunar month, Buddha's birthday in the fourth or fifth lunar month, and Vu Lan, the festival for parents, in the seventh. Tet, the lunar new year, is the busiest time of all. Allow forty-five minutes to an hour. Combine the pagoda with a boat trip to the islands of the Tien River, the floating market further south at Cai Be and an overnight stay in the delta if time allows.