Bai Dinh Pagoda

Bai Dinh is two things on one hill. The old pagoda is a small complex of caves and shrines dating from the eleventh century, associated with the monk Nguyen Minh Khong. The new one, built from 2003 on the slope below it, is on a completely different scale: courtyards, a bronze Buddha of about a hundred tonnes, a bell of thirty-six tonnes, a stupa tower, and a corridor of five hundred stone arhat figures running for something over a kilometre - the largest pagoda complex in Vietnam by a long way, and a project that divides opinion between those who see it as devotion at scale and those who see it as concrete.

What you actually see

• An eleventh century cave pagoda - the small original on the hill.
• A vast new complex from 2003 - built on the slope below it.
• Five hundred stone arhats - along more than a kilometre of corridor.
• A hundred-tonne bronze Buddha - and a thirty-six tonne bell.

When to go

Year round; the spring festival brings very large crowds. Half a day.

Honest expectations

Distances inside are long and most people take the electric carts, which are charged. Much of it is very new, which disappoints visitors expecting antiquity. It is crowded in festival months.

Nearby

Trang An is next door; Hoa Lu and Tam Coc are east.