Ho Chi Minh City — still widely known by its former name, Saigon — is Vietnam's commercial powerhouse and its most electric city, a place where gilded French colonial buildings, incense-filled pagodas, and glass-and-steel towers share the same crowded, motorbike-swarmed streets. It is a city of contrasts: the stately Notre-Dame Cathedral Basilica stands a few blocks from the sobering exhibits of the War Remnants Museum, while rooftop bars overlook markets that have traded in the same spot for over a century. For travellers, it is less a collection of sights than an atmosphere to be absorbed — best done on foot, with frequent stops for coffee, and a healthy tolerance for the traffic.
Ho Chi Minh City is the southern terminus of the SJourney Vietnam Luxury Express, a beautifully restored sleeper train evoking 1930s Indochine elegance that links the capital, Hanoi, with Saigon across an eight-day, seven-night rail odyssey. Travelling this route by train transforms the journey itself into part of the destination, threading past the limestone karsts of Ninh Binh, the imperial city of Hue, and the lantern-lit lanes of Hoi An before delivering guests into the pulsing heart of southern Vietnam. Arriving in Ho Chi Minh City this way — after days spent watching the country's landscapes and history unfold from a private cabin or the lounge car — gives the city's frenetic energy a rich sense of context and arrival.
Whether it is your first stop in Vietnam or the grand finale of a rail journey the length of the country, Ho Chi Minh City rewards travellers who linger: a few days here are enough to walk the colonial core, dive into the Cu Chi tunnels' wartime history, and eat extraordinarily well, all before continuing your onward travels with Palace Trains.
- ✦French colonial landmarks in District 1
- ✦War Remnants Museum and Reunification Palace
- ✦Cu Chi Tunnels day trip
- ✦Legendary street food, from pho to banh mi
- ✦Ben Thanh Market and night market
- ✦Southern terminus of the SJourney Vietnam Luxury Express
- ✦Rooftop bars over the Saigon skyline
Places to See in Ho Chi Minh City
Notre-Dame Cathedral Basilica
Built by French colonists between 1863 and 1880 with bricks imported from Marseille and twin neo-Romanesque towers, this red-brick cathedral anchors the city's colonial-era square and remains one of Saigon's most photographed landmarks.
Central Post Office
Designed in the late 19th century under French rule (often associated with Gustave Eiffel's workshop for its ironwork), this grand hall of green shutters and vaulted ceilings still functions as a working post office beside the cathedral.
War Remnants Museum
A powerful and unflinching museum documenting the Vietnam War through photography, military hardware, and personal testimony — one of the most visited and moving sights in the city.
Cu Chi Tunnels
An extensive network of underground tunnels used by Viet Cong guerrillas, located roughly 40 kilometres northwest of the city centre; visitors can crawl through widened sections and see recreated wartime booby traps and living quarters.
Reunification Palace
The former South Vietnamese presidential palace, preserved almost exactly as it stood on 30 April 1975 when tanks crashed through its gates, ending the war — a striking piece of mid-century architecture and history in one.
Ben Thanh Market
One of Saigon's oldest and most iconic markets, its distinctive clock-tower entrance opening onto a maze of stalls selling everything from lacquerware and silk to snacks and street food, especially lively after dark at the surrounding night market.
Jade Emperor Pagoda
A richly atmospheric Taoist temple from 1909, thick with incense smoke and packed with elaborate carved figures depicting Chinese and Buddhist deities.
Bitexco Financial Tower Skydeck
The city's dramatic helipad-topped skyscraper offers a 49th-floor observation deck with panoramic views over the Saigon River and the sprawling cityscape below.
Bui Vien Walking Street
The backpacker quarter of District 1 comes alive nightly with bars, street performers, and food stalls, offering a lively counterpoint to the city's more solemn historical sites.
Food & Gastronomy
Ho Chi Minh City is one of the great street-food capitals of Asia, its pavements lined with tiny plastic stools and simmering pots from dawn until well past midnight. Southern Vietnamese cooking tends to be sweeter and more herb-forward than the cuisine of Hanoi, shaped by the abundance of the Mekong Delta and generations of Chinese and French influence.
- Pho — the classic beef or chicken noodle soup, found on nearly every corner, with a lighter, sweeter broth in its southern style than in the north.
- Banh mi — the iconic Vietnamese baguette sandwich, a legacy of French colonial bread-making stuffed with pâté, pork, pickled vegetables, and fresh herbs.
- Com tam (broken rice) — a beloved Saigon specialty of grilled pork chop, fried egg, and pickles served over fractured rice grains.
- Banh xeo — crispy turmeric-yellow rice-flour crepes filled with shrimp, pork, and bean sprouts, wrapped in lettuce and herbs and dipped in nuoc cham.
- Hu tieu — a Chinese-Khmer-influenced noodle soup particular to the south, served with pork, shrimp, and a clear, delicately sweet broth.
- Vietnamese iced coffee (ca phe sua da) — strong drip coffee sweetened with condensed milk, served over ice, best sampled at an old-school café or a rooftop overlooking the city.
- Che — a category of sweet dessert soups and puddings made with beans, jellies, coconut milk, and fruit, sold from market stalls as a refreshing treat.
For an immersive introduction, wander the food stalls of Ben Thanh Market or the Bui Vien area, though some of the city's best bowls of pho and banh mi come from unmarked family-run stands identifiable only by the queue outside. Rooftop bars across District 1 also offer an excellent vantage point for an evening drink over the glittering skyline.
