BA VANG PAGODA
The pagoda is situated in Thanh Dang Mountain ,at a height of 340m in from see level in beautiful position of Uong Bi City, Quang Ninh Province.
Ba Vang Pagoda preserves unique Buddhist cultural values, especially Truc Lam Yen Tu Zen. The pagoda was built in 1706 under the dynasty of King Le Du Tong. Its founder is Zen Master Mahasamon- Tue Bich Pho Giac. The current architecture is the result of the renovation in 2011.
Ba Vang pagoda has an area of about 22ha which is located Thanh Dang mountain, opposite to the Bang Dang River and being surrounded by pine forest.
The pagoda includes a large forecourt, a sanctum, a Holy Mother’s temple, a Mountain Spirit temple, and an old long standing well.
Ba Vang Pagoda also has a great system of wooden statues and valuable antiques, especially the red wooden drum recognized as the biggest one of Viet Nam by Viet Nam Records Organization in 2014.
Ba Vang Pagoda is the only place in Quang Ninh Province to organize Chrysanthemum Festival to honor the chrysanthemum – the symbol of Buddhist culture associated with Truc Lam Yen
Tu Zen. The festival includes many activities such as water procession from the old well to the sanctum, offerings ceremony, chrysanthemum arranging contest, enjoying chrysanthemum tea and with many other activities.
Photographing with foreigners are also an interesting activity. They are very friendly and ready to take pictures with everybody .
Coming to Ha Long night market, visitors will have a memorable experience.
Three gate have a garntry on the plastic trail to the pagoda. A gate to the middle of the parking lot the mountain and an internal gate way to the main temple.
The internal three-door gate has the Northern pagoda style architecture with the largest middle door. Above the three doors are three steeples attached to the statues of dragon, unicorn, turtle, and phoenix. The front of the internal three-door gate is engraved the parallel sentences in Han character and faces the semicircular lake, where has a pagoda designed after the architecture of One Pillar Pagoda in Ha Noi.
The largeest and most monumental mention is Dai Hung Bao Zen, also as the main temple has a 2- storey architecture. Scake is over 4000m2. This is the main throne that have been recognized by the Indochina record organization as” the largest mountain in Indochina” the highlight of the main hall is the entire architecture of the columns, raft, seams, roofs are made of reinforced concrete but painted with wood, so should see the eyes of the temple is still pure Vietnamese.
The two arhats with 18 arhats are carved in monolithic stone, each one is a manifertation of the human melancholy of the human craving of the carving extremely lively. As long with that is a system of non- parallel sentence lacquered yellow cards, stone painting, engraved with elaborate motifs bearing bold cultural inprints tran contributed to the monument more majestic brilliant.
The campus of the temple has a large land many large land stone carving.
Amitabha Buddha statue is one of the largest wooden Buddha statue in the north.
Despite of being lt ocated in over 300 meter from the sea level. It has never run out of water and this course of stream starts from hillside and run all year round. Legend started that anyone who has great blessing to drink even a guld of fresh water here on the New year’s Eve will escape from many disease.
Quang Ninh People’s Committee has ranked it among province’s historical heritage sites.
The Ba Vang Pagoda is likely to become a well known spiritual tourism destination attracting lots of domestic and foreign tourist and Buddhist pilgrims. According to the organizers, during the two days of March 8 and 9, the pagoda welcomed about 100,000 tourists. Ba Vang Pagoda preserves unique Buddhist cultural values, especially Truc Lam Yen Tu Zen.