After a leisurely lie-in we planned the day ahead, our first full one in Georgetown. We were at a bit of an advantage over some tourists as my sister Amanda had been here a few days previous and Alain had sent us a message with possible places to go, we needed to find a street map.
Setting off using Google maps we were at least heading in the right direction with the added bonus of passing an ATM at an impressive Citibank building, at 10 in the morning it was getting very hot.
A friendly local pointed us the general direction of the centre and we stopped outside a restaurant called The Ship, a steakhouse, on Jalan Sri Bahari. We'd actually seen this franchise advertised in the Air Asia Inflight magazine so made a mental note. It did however have a selection of leaflets and attached to their daily set menu was a street map of downtown Georgetown - result.
Stopping at a coffee come snack franchise we went in for breakfast and to study our map. It turned out to be a disaster as the coffee was that Asian mix of a coffee, milk and sugar, Lynn hasn't done sugar since she was ten. The eggs looked like the hen had just laid them, the bread was sweet and there was no toilet paper or hand towels in the loo, we didn't hang around.
We now set off on a journey of adventure and culture round the old heritage sites of Georgetown (should be on the telly, me!). Between Alains message and the map we discovered much of the street art that decorates the old town as well as clocking some of the eateries and bars I'd sussed out from the Lonely Planet guidebook, however once again we came across places where we couldn't work out if they were open or not. Seemed to us the best time to see everything again would be at night, now we know where we're going.
Chew Pier was facinating. It was a mixture of dwellings and small touristy businesses that jutted out into the sea, Lynn even managed to buy a pair of Gucci sunglasses, now, you wouldn't get that in Morecambe!
We came across a random site as we were walking back to the hotel, Northam Road Protestant Cemetary. It was built in 1786 by the British East India Company and was the first ever Christian cemetary to be built in Asia - a facinating interlude and totally out of the blue. I expect we will unearth other places not on the tourist map on our visit here.
The street map was proving invaluable as it was laid out with all the street art, cafes and places of interest colour coded and numbered or lettered. In the end and on our return to the hotel we'd actually walked over five and a half miles. Yes it was hot but when you are actually just wandering, being a tourist, you don't really notice the distance.
Our first impressions were that this is going to be a facinating place to explore more thoughroughly and armed with our map and guidebook we should get in most of the main highlights of the town. As for the people, they are very friendly and the melting pot of Chinese, Indian and Malay gives the place a cosmopolitan edge over some of the other cities we have visited so far - we can't wait to see and meet more.
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