Afternoon Saigon City Historical Tour

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Ho Chi Minh City is a 400-year-old city in Vietnam that witnessed many historical transformations. Before 1975, the city was called Saigon, it’s a very memorable name that is still used majorly nowadays. So what is the storyline of Saigon? And what is the meaning of the good old name? Every question will be answered in the City tour of Saigon On Vespa!

The first place to be is the Independent Palace: One of the most unique historical sites throughout Vietnam, which used to be the head-quarter of the old government before the 1970s. The destination is now selected to be a special heritage as it keeps a lot of monuments and remnants.

The next place is the Notre Dame Cathedral of Saigon and the City Central Post Office right in the middle of the city. Both of them are the symbols of Ho Chi Minh city. Those two buildings were the art of French colonists at the end of the XIX century.

Back on road, the Vespa team will take you to see the impressive structures of the Opera House, Nguyen Hue Walking Street and the City Hall of Saigon.

Getting to the War Remnants Museum, you will acknowledge about Vietnam War and the crimes which were committed during wartime.

Last but not least, we will stop at the JADE-EMPEROR PAGODA, one of the most spectacularly colorful temples dedicated to the King of Heaven and filled worth exquisite and phantasmal statues. This is also the place that President Barack Obama has visited in 2016.

TOUR INFORMATION

Duration

4 Hour(s)

Price per Participant

$ 55

Price per child

$ 35

Languages

English

Group size

Notre-Dame Cathedral of Saigon

Address: No.1 Cong xa Paris St, Ben Nghe Ward, District 1, Ho Chi Minh City

The Notre-Dame Cathedral is one of the most attractive sites in Ho Chi Minh city in the last 2 centuries. It occupies the bustling Paris Commune Square in the downtown, gaining opularity as a pilgrimage site among Catholic believers and foreign and local visitors as well.

Back in the late 19th century, when the French conquered Vietnam, the French government ordered the construction of a large church that served as a place of worship and community services for French colonists. In 1863, the church’s construction was first started on the bank of the Charner canal (Kinh Lon). Two years later, the wooden building was completed and named “Saigon Church”; however, it was quickly damaged by termites. In 1877, the church was reconstructed with materials shipped from France under the supervision of esteemed architect Admiral Bourard. The cathedral took three years to complete and cost 2,500,000 French francs, financed by the French Cochinchine government; thus, people called it the State Cathedral.

Nowadays, this 159-year-old cathedral still functions as a religious stronghold for roughly 6.2 million Catholics in Saigon and a striking relic for tourists. Currently, Ho Chi Minh City Archdiocese is launching an extensive renovation project on Sai Gon Notre Dame Basilica, scheduled from 2017 to 2023, which would cost an estimated US$ 6 million. But the renovation would not change the original design of this landmark. “The Big Church of Saigon” features a distinctive neo-Romanesque and Gothic design, forming its solemn and elegant overlook. The magnificent grandeur is characterized by twin bell towers, ornate stained-glass windows, and a red-brick facade.

In front of the church, there was a bronze statue of Bishop Pigneau de Behaine with Prince Canh, the eldest son of Emperor Gia Long, erected on a red marble pedestal. In 1945, the statue was removed while its pedestal remained. In 1959, Bishop Joseph Pham Van Thien imported a statue of Our Lady of Peace made with granite in Rome and settled it on the empty pedestal. The cathedral was declared Notre Dame Cathedral after the statue ceremony in the same year.