Penang Island is in the north of Malaysia, just south of the Thai border and separated from the Malay mainland by three large bridges. It is one of those Goldilocks type of places that has just a little bit of everything. If you want gorgeous beaches, it has them in the north. If you want secluded mangroves, they are in the west. If you want a bit of mountains, there’s Penang Hill at 833 meters (2,700 feet) with its 130 million year old untouched rainforests.
If you want amazing food, you definitely have that: in 2014, Lonely Planet deemed Penang to be the top foodie destination to visit in the world. If you want shopping, there’s two world class shopping malls and tons of small boutiques. If you want charm, there’s the historic George Town district. Penang is also a global center for medical tourism with most medical staff having been trained abroad and speaking English.
The most famous part of Penang Island is the older parts of George Town. It has a fascinating collection of wall art; both paintings and light metal sculptures.
The streets are a wonderful mix of European, Chinese and Malay themed buildings.
One of the coolest places in Penang is the Hin Bus Depot which is a collection of a handful of small stores and coffee shops in a converted bus station.
On the weekends there are whole range of craft artists and food booths.
I decided to try a Korean roasted marshmellow ice cream dessert. The vendor pulled a frozen marshmellow covering dark chocolate ice cream from a freezer and then used a Godzilla head blowtorch roast the outside of the marshmellow covering. It was very good.
Penang’s famous food scene is built around hawkers. These are small stalls, usually in a collected food court, with specific family recipes that have been honed over dozens of years, and sometimes multiple generations. Below I’m having a core hawker noodle dish called char kway teow at a small hawker stall area near my apartment.
A very tender pork dish with chicken broth soup in a nondescript family restaurant with a Michelin mention.
A fascinating dish of luosifen, or Chinese snail noodles. These are a famous, pungent, and highly savory dish featuring rice noodles in a rich broth made from river snails and pork bones, topped with fermented bamboo shoots, fried tofu skin, peanuts, and chili oil. Yes, that’s right, river snail broth. It really had a wonderful, unique taste.
A Taiwanese four beans dessert including butter beans, chick peas, red kidney beans and baby lima beans with peanuts, cream and a molasses type of sauce to pour into it. It had a nice taste, but there are better dessert options for all these carbs and sugars (like Korean roasted marshmellow ice cream on a stick 🙂 )
People either love durians or hate them. I really enjoy them. Penang is known as possibly having the best durians in SE Asia. This one literally melted in my mouth when I ate it.
The KOMTAR Tower is the tallest building in Penang at 36 stories, and has a theme park on its top three floors as well as a restaurant and skywalk on the top floor.
The outside bar area was way too hot for anyone to be at on a sultry afternoon in the middle of an April SE Asia heat wave, but I’d image it’s much more popular at night.
Looking down from the skywalk.
A view of the old section of George Town.
And the other parts of a 360 degree view of the urban areas of the island.
The Floating Mosque is sits on the water just north of the main part of the city.
It’s surrounded by high rise condominiums.
And it sits next to a local beach where some people still hang on to their more traditional life as they are surrounded by the encroaching high rises.
You can take the 100 year old funicular to the 2,700 foot high Penang Hill. It’s a nice ride.
Their are really nice views of the island from the top.
The top of the hill is surrounded by lush jungle.
There’s both a small Hindu temple and a gold domed mosque at the top.
The Upside Down House is a fun place to take some pictures. In each of these I’m actually on the floor with the scenary attached to the walls and ceiling. The photos are then rotated.
I’m dropping in for breakfast.
It’s a Sunday morning and I’m just hanging out in the bedroom figuring what to do the rest of the day.
Damn, some of these Asian bum guns are strong…this one shot me up to the ceiling!
I seem to be in my own personal spin cycle.
Just setting up the scrabble board.
