6 Best Sights in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Honoring Vietnam's national dress, this private museum is set on stunningly picturesque grounds that are a very long way from downtown. Once you pay the admission fee, a guide will take you to the two beautiful wooden exhibition houses, which showcase ao dais from the 17th century to the modern day. Smaller kids will like feeding the fish and playing ao dai quoits (and generally letting off steam on the verdant lawns if they're all city-ed out). This place is—amazingly—still off the tourist radar.

Be sure to go inside to check out the huge map of old Indochina in this classic French-colonial building, designed by French architect Alfred Foulhoux (and not Gustave Eiffel as some sources claim) and completed in 1891. In addition to the usual mail services, there are phones, fax machines, and a small gift shop.

The outside of this museum showcasing the history of traditional Vietnamese medicine might be plain, but inside it's a fabulous carved wooden wonderland, with the interior of an authentic antique house on the third floor and a re-created Cham-style gazebo on the rooftop. Displays, enhanced by audiovisuals and drawing on nearly 3,000 items in the collection, range from Stone Age pots to 3rd-century coins (for coin-rubbing therapy), ancient texts, bronze kettles, and a range of cutting, chopping, and storing utensils. The concluding part of the introductory film (subtitled in English) and the shop at the exit are a reminder that this is a private museum, set up by Fito Pharma. It's well worth a visit for the insight into traditional Vietnamese daily life through the ages.

This is one of the more potent symbols of the Vietnam War. On April 30, 1975, a North Vietnamese Army tank smashed through the main gate of what was then known as the Independence Palace, ending one of the bloodiest conflicts in living memory. The current boxy building replaced the elegant French colonial–style Norodom Palace, which was bombed by fighter jets in 1962 in an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate South Vietnam's President Ngo Dinh Diem. The jet, along with the tanks that ended the war, is on display on the grounds. Free guides are available inside the palace, which remains as it was on that fateful day in 1975, albeit slightly more worn. The time-capsule nature of the palace offers a fascinating insight into the high life of 1960s Saigon, when bigwigs would enjoy tea and movie screenings in plush rooms upstairs, while the war effort was directed from the spartan concrete warren in the basement. The gardens cover 44 acres of lush lawn and shady trees, and a large fountain in front of the palace redirects the bad luck that could flow into the palace from the broad boulevard of Le Duan Street, according to the principles of feng shui.

This huge park, a block behind the Reunification Palace, has a little something for everyone: walking paths for strolling or jogging; tall trees for shade; open areas where exercise classes are held in the mornings and evenings; a miniature Cham tower; a replica Hung King Temple; and an extensive children's playground. There's also a coffee stand, known as the bird café, at the Cach Mang Thang Tam entrance, and every morning bird fanciers bring their feathered friends here for singing practice. Do pull up a plastic chair and enjoy the ruckus and the theater of finicky owners trying to position their birds in order to generate the loudest birdsong. The birds are usually taken home by 9 am—by motorbike, which is a spectacle in itself. Leading up to Tet, the lunar new year, a spring festival is held in the park, with live entertainment and food and handicrafts stalls.

A large government-owned tourist park, Van Thanh is a lovely escape from Ho Chi Minh City's urban chaos, with its artificial lake, restaurants, swimming pool, and small children's playground. The food isn't brilliant but dining in a little hut over the lake is fun, and the grounds and buildings are picturesque "ancient Vietnam" style. Entry to the pool, which gets very crowded on weekends, is 70,000d.