Festival «Vu Lan báo hiếu Ngũ Hành Sơn 2026»

   The seventh-moon full moon observed inside a limestone mountain that contains a cave staged as the underworld — it is hard to imagine a more fitting setting for a festival about filial duty. If you are in Đà Nẵng in late August, this is the chance to see the Marble Mountains in a state quite unlike an ordinary visiting day.

   The festival has two halves: the rites, including a lamp-transmission ceremony praying for national peace and the Cổ Phật khất thực alms procession of monks; and the public half, with performances, exhibitions, calligraphy given to visitors, and the pinning of a rose on each guest as a token of filial gratitude.

   First held in 2017, the festival has drawn more than 10,000 visitors per edition in recent years.

   Why Vu Lan. The observance descends from the story of Maudgalyāyana, who set out the Vu Lan bowl and asked the Buddha's community to intercede so his mother could be freed from the realm of hungry ghosts — the same story staged on Thủy Sơn. Inside the Âm Phủ cave stands a figure of Kṣitigarbha, the bodhisattva who vowed to rescue beings from hell.

   About the site. Emperor Minh Mạng gave the mountains their name after the five elements — metal, wood, water, fire and earth — in the first half of the 19th century. In 2018 the complex was listed as a Special National Monument. On 26 November 2022 its ma nhai inscriptions — Hán and Nôm characters carved into the rock faces, dating from the early 17th to the mid-20th century — were entered into UNESCO's Memory of the World register for Asia and the Pacific.

   The day-by-day programme is usually published by the organisers only shortly before the opening, so call the site management on +84 236 3961114 if you want to time your visit to a particular rite.

   One practical point: the festival area covers both Thủy Sơn and the Âm Phủ cave, and these are separate tickets. If you intend to see all of it, buy both at the gate rather than halfway up.

   Go for the evening lamp ceremony if you can choose your hour — that is when the mountain looks least like a daytime tourist stop.