Penang, Malaysia

Little did we know it would be one of the busiest weekends of the year to travel. Lucky for us we had no real delays and we arrived in Penang in no time. With Penang being an island, I'm sure your wondering how the boat was! Was it a bumpy ride or was it smooth all the way over? It was neither! Many years ago, this very clever nation built a connecting bridge to the island from the main land. How clever is that! Why can't Ireland build one to mainland Europe? When we arrived however, we had a big problem finding accommodation. After an hour or so walking around trying to find somewhere that was of an acceptable standard, we began to realise that travelling in Malaysia during 'Ramadan' is not such a great idea! With our angels behind us, we eventually found 'Hotel Malaysia.' The room was clean but very 1990's! To be honest, it wasn't worth the money. We did have a nice sleep, which of course is very important! After our nice, long sleep it was time to get up and check out and check in to somewhere a bit nicer. Somewhere just off the famous 'Love Lane.' A lovely place called 'Ryokan Chic Hostels.' Myself and Jason had a really nice time here. The staff are lovely, the dorm we were in was really comfortable and the best part of all is that we had the whole room to ourselves bar the first night when two Chinese people stayed with us. To be fair, they only slept in the room. When we woke up the following morning, they were gone. From that point forward, we had no other disturbances. It was like our own private room but at dorm prices! Happy snappy days! One of the nice things about the hostel is that it has a real family atmosphere. It's unusual but nice to see children staying in a hostel! Penang is one of the most beautiful places I have ever visited. In 2008, 'George Town' was given the prestige 'UNESCO World Heritage Site.' Rightly so! The buildings here are stunning, with a lot of them built in an old English colloquial style. Some of them are very distressed looking but are beautiful in their own right. At night, you can see bats flying out of them, which is a bit scary, especially when walking past them. It was bad enough having one bat pist on me, I'm sorry, but I don't want another one! One of the main reasons I fell in love with this place is that there are really charming, quirky cafés that are situated all around the town! One in particular we went to was called 'Purrfect Cat Café.' I will put it this way to you, if you don't like cats, then you won't like this place. If The Mad Cat Lady ever opened a business, this would be it, except, the walls would be covered with a mural of the Lovely Alps and 'Switzerland Number 1' signs everywhere! It's a really cool place. There is a room you can go into where you can spend a bit of time playing with them. They had some beautiful creatures including a stunning Garfield lookalike! You can definitely see the cats are well looked after. They are very cute! Another café we went to centered around a bike theme. It definitely made we wish I had my lovely bike with me. After all, it did serve me well over the years! Our favourite place for food was 'Little India.' The food here was so cheap and so tasty. You can't come to Penang without trying the amazing food! It would definitely have you craving for more! Of course, Penang isn't just famous for its food, oh no, it's also very famous for its incredible street art which depicts real life and which has been popping up around the town only since 2012! The street art is breathtaking and is definitely one of my favourite things I have ever seen. It's simply incredible and you can't appreciate it until you see it in reality! One of the days we spent trying to find them all, before we realised, we had walked the entire town. I think I was annoying poor old Jason as I kept on stopping to take photos of everything. Wanting to constantly know more, I even squeezed in a nice trip down to the local 'Camera Museum' which was very interesting with a great collection of cameras on display. They even had a very old image depicting one of the worlds first selfie. Old people can be cool too! We even managed to check out 'The Penang Time Tunnel' history museum. It to was very interesting with really cool exhibits on display as you walk through. The best part was 'The 3D Mural Art Street' in which myself and Jason had a great time posing for some really cool pictures. It was great fun! They even had an area that made you look like you were upside down. It was brilliant and definitely a place where you can let the inner child in you come out! All in all, I can honestly say that we saw all of George Town and what a beautiful town it is! We even got to see 'Fort Cornwallis' which was originally built by Captain Sir Francis Light who took formal possession of the island in 1786. Light renamed the island 'Prince of Wales' but the name never stuck. Fort Cornwallis is the largest standing fort in Malaysia. From there we headed over to 'The Queen Victoria Memorial Clock Tower' which is one of Penang's most famous icons. It was originally built in 1897 to commemorate Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. The tower is 60 feet tall with each foot representing every year the Queen had reigned. For our last night in Penang, we spent it in a bar smoking a cigar, drinking Guinness and sipping a glass of twelve year old whiskey! What better way to end a perfect trip to a perfect place! While Penang is a very historical place to visit with lots of really interesting and cool things to do, it's also a place where you can just chill out, especially in one of the quirky cafés on offer. Penang is, with out any doubt one of my favourite places I have visited so far and some day I will return. I might even retire here!

By Andrew

#streetart #littleindia #culture #fortcornwallis