Long Son Pagoda, Nha Trang

Long Son Pagoda is popular temple with a large statue on a hilltop located near Nha Trang Railway Station.

Long Son Pagoda is well worth visiting for an hour or two, particularly if you have some time to wait between checking out of your hotel and boarding a train. The temple also has an excellent vegetarian restaurant near the main entrance which is one of the best places in that part of Nha Trang town to eat lunch. The service in the restaurant is very polite and the proceeds from the sale of food and drink go towards maintaining the temple, which is free to visit.

About Long Son Pagoda

Long Son Pagoda was originally built in another part of Nha Trang in 1886, also on a hill, and moved to it current location in 1900 after the original temple was destroyed during a storm. 

Long Son Pagoda is a temple of two parts. The first part of the temple is by the main entrance at road level. This part of the temple consists of several buildings including an ornate prayer hall. complete with altar, a restaurant, a religious school and residences for the Buddhist monks and staff who live, worship and work there. The prayer hall is particularly noteworthy as the temple has been faithfully rebuilt using the original design of the 1886 temple with Taoist style design features.

After this cluster of buildings a series of flights of stairs ascends Trai Thuy Hill. Be warned: there are 152 steps to climb to reach the top.

On the route up to the top of the hill there are some interesting statues and reliefs. The most interesting of these is a large reclining Buddha with a relief behind representing the monks who died protesting against attempts by the South Vietnamese Government during the 1950s to reign in freedom of belief in the country.

At the top of the hill, after the 152 steps, is a 24 metre high statue of Buddha. The statue is white and features a small room contained within the base of the statue containing an altar.

The other thing that makes it worth while walking up the 152 steps is the view of the city from the platform where the statue is located.

Travel to Long Son Pagoda

The best way to travel to Nha Trang to visit Long Son Pagoda is to travel by train. The train journey from Saigon to Nha Trang takes 7 to 9 hours and 9 to 11 hours to travel by train from Da Nang to Nha Trang. From the train station its a 500 metre walk to Long Son Pagoda.

Long Son Pagoda is on city bus route #6 which costs 7,000 VND for a journey northwards through Nha Trang town centre and over the bridge to Po Nagar Temple.