Penang is the oldest British settlement in Malaysia, predating both Singapore and Melaka. It is also one of Malaysia's major tourist attractions. This is hardly surprising, for the 285 sq km Penang Island has popular beach resorts and an intriguing and historically interesting town which is also noted for its superb food.

Penang's major city, Georgetown, is often referred to as Penang, although correctly that is the name of the island (the actual Malay spelling is Pinang). Central Georgetown is a sprawling, somewhat grotty Chinese city, steeped in history and with plenty of old character that is fast disappearing elsewhere. If you walk from the ferry to Chinatown, the main tourist centre around Lebuh Chulia, it would seem that Penang missed the development boom sweeping the rest of the country. However, high-rise apartments and industrial areas crowd the outskirts of expanding Georgetown, especially south towards the bridge and airport, and west to the beaches.

Penang's beaches are touted as a big drawcard for visitors. The main resort of Batu Ferringhi has its appeal, but the beaches are not as spectacular as the tourist literature would make out. Beaches close to the city suffer to some extent from pollution. The beaches along the north coast are the most visited and easily accessible, while those around the south of the island am undeveloped and difficult to reach.

Georgetown

Georgetown is a real Chinatown, with far more Chinese flavour than Singapore or Hong Kong. Those larger cities have had their Chinese flavour submerged under a gleaming concrete, glass and chrome confusion, but in the older parts of Georgetown the clock seems to have stopped 50 years ago. It's an easy-going, colourful city full of crumbling old shophouses, bicycle rickshaws and ancient trades.

The city has plenty of reminders of colonial rule, and its winding streets and old temples are always fascinating to wander around. Most visitors to the island stay in Georgetown, which is well supplied with hotels, restaurants and all the facilities of a major city.

Orientation

The old city of Georgetown has a population of 220,000, and the greater urban area has a population of 400,000 out of a total of just over half a million for the whole island. Georgetown is in the north-east of the island, where the straits between the island and the mainland are at their narrowest.

A vehicle and passenger ferry service operates 24 hours a day across the three-kniwide channel between Georgetown and Butterworth on the mainland. South of the ferry crossing is the Penang Bridge - the longest in South-East Asia - which links the island with Malaysia's North-South Highway (Lebuh Raya).

Georgetown is a compact city and most places can easily be reached on foot or by bicycle rickshaw. The old colonial part of town centres on Fort Cornwallis. Lebuh Pantai is the main street of the 'city', the financial district crammed with banks and stately buildings that once housed the colonial administration.

You'll find most of Georgetown's popular cheap hotels along Lebuh Chulia in Chinatown. Jalan Penang is a main thoroughfare and a popular shopping street. In this area you'll find a number of the more expensive hotels, including, at the waterfront end of Jalan Penang, the venerable Eastern & Oriental Hotel.

If you follow Jalan Penang south you'll pass the modem multistorey Kompleks Tun Abdul Razak (Komtar), where the MAS office is located, and eventually leave town and continue towards the Bayan Lepas Airport. If you turn west at the waterfront end of Jalan Penang, you follow the coastline and eventually come to the northern beaches, including Batu Ferringhi. This road runs right around the island and eventually brings you back into town, via the airport.