Hanoi Museum

The western temple, dedicated to Prince Linh Lang, a son of King Lý Thái Tông and his 9th concubine Dương Thị Quang, who was killed in action at the Battle of Như Nguyệt River in a war with China's Song Dynasty. The name Voi Phục means "kneeling elephant", and you can see two statues of elephants in a kneeling position at the front of the temple, hence its name.

Originally a modest museum located next to the Flag Tower, the Military History Museum and all its 150,000 artifacts has been relocated in 2024 to an enormous 39-hectare compound in the city's outskirts, 12 km from its original location. Now the largest and most modern museum in all of Vietnam, the imposing main building covers the country's military history extending back some two millennia. All museum exhibits and videos are captioned in Vietnamese and English. The vast courtyard houses dozens of military vehicles, aircraft and artillery; many of which are French, American and South Vietnamese assets captured in the Indochina wars. Extremely popular with locals, the museum is usually completely packed on weekends, with dozens of tour buses ferrying out-of-town visitors to the site. Peak queuing times can exceed an hour as a result, so try to visit early on a weekday if possible; give the museum a call beforehand to check how busy it is.

Exhibitions cover mainly the culture and ritual practices of the various ethnic groups in the whole of Vietnam. One of the key attractions of the museum is the open-air exhibition, which has reconstructions of traditional houses from multiple ethnic groups, which even comes with inhabitants in costumes. The museum features actual explanations of the exhibits in Vietnamese, French and English. There is an excellent café on the premises.

There's a UH-1 helicopter, Soviet-built MiG fighters, a huge Mi-6 helicopter and other aircraft. Unfortunately they've been exposed to the elements for some time and local children climb over them.

Until 19 Dec 1972, this was just a small brackish pond just off Hoàng Hoa Thám St., about 1 km west of the mausoleum. On that day, in a twisted retelling of the Hoan Kiem legend, Vietnamese anti-aircraft missiles blasted the enemy's eight-engine, 100-ton aircraft and sent it to the shallow bottom of the lake, where it remains.

The southern temple, dedicated to Cao Sơn Đại Vương, a Vietnamese mountain god who is said to be a son of King Lạc Long Quân of the ancient Hồng Bàng dynasty and his wife, the immortal mountain snow goddess Âu Cơ.