Penang

A Lithuanian artist's children on a bicycle started it in 2012. There are now enough that people hunt them with a map. Real bicycles and motorbikes are fixed to the walls, so a photograph reads the object as part of the painting. Peeling paint is left alone.

Set aside two hours. The temple is a whole hillside. An inclined lift covers the last stretch to the 30.2-metre Kuan Yin, and the pagoda changes style by level, Chinese to Thai to Burmese. Lanterns are lit at night for a month around Lunar New Year.

A funicular climbs the 833 metres in five minutes. The top runs about five degrees cooler than town, which is why the British built bungalows up here, and those houses still stand. Go too early and the cloud has not lifted, so the city is not there to see.

Seeing inside means catching one of three guided times a day. Indigo lime gives the walls their blue, and the window frames and tiles were shipped from Scotland and England. Bought close to collapse in the 1990s and restored, it works as a hotel too.

Each surname laid its own jetty and built houses along it, lived in for over a century. Six remain, and the Chew jetty is the longest and the one visitors fill, though these are homes: nobody goes past an open door.

You sign your name at the gate. Monkey Beach is ninety minutes on foot or fifteen by boat, and plenty of people walk in and ride back. At high tide the rocky shore floods and the forest path is the only way, so check the tide first.

It sets out how one household lived, room by room. The mansion of a Peranakan merchant opened as it stood, so inlaid furniture, European tiles and Chinese carving stand together, and a whole room holds the gold a bride would wear. You may walk it unguided.

A star fort on the spot where Francis Light landed in 1786, its guns almost never fired. Inside the walls is mostly lawn, so there is little to see, but the promenade along the sea runs on from here and walks well in the evening.

The night market along the road is better known than the beach itself. The water is murky and jellyfish turn up in season, so many people swim in the hotel pool instead. Stalls run from seven until midnight and bargaining starts at half the asking price.

Indian Muslim traders built it in 1801, under Mughal domes and a minaret. A Hindu temple, a Chinese temple and a church all stand within five minutes on the same street, which is why the stretch is called the Street of Harmony.

Clan hall of the Khoo family from Fujian, roof and pillars smothered in carving and gold leaf. You cannot see it from the main road; a narrow passage off Cannon Street opens onto the square. Facing the hall stands an old Chinese opera stage.

Laid out by the British in 1884 in a quarry valley, once known as the Waterfall Gardens. Long-tailed macaques and dusky leaf monkeys settle on the paths. Near the main gate a jeep track sets off uphill towards Penang Hill for walkers.

A Thai Buddhist temple on Burma Lane whose hall holds a long golden reclining Buddha. Niches behind the statue hold rows of urns with ashes. A Burmese temple faces it from across the lane, so both fit into a single stop.

Founded in 1803 and counted as Penang's oldest Buddhist temple. A pair of white elephants guard the gate, and people toss coins into the courtyard pond for wishes. The Buddha faces are Burmese in style, a contrast you see right after the Thai temple opposite.

Lookout floors atop Komtar in central George Town. Its Rainbow Skywalk is a glass-floored ledge jutting outside the building, with the streets straight below. On clear days the view reaches Penang Bridge and the mainland; many return after dark.

A temple put up in 1850 at Bayan Lepas near the airport, with pit vipers draped over the altar and branches. The incense smoke is said to make them drowsy and still. There are fewer snakes than in the past, and they are not to be touched.

The Penang Butterfly Farm, running since 1986, rebuilt and renamed in 2016. Butterflies land on shoulders in a big netted garden, and indoor galleries carry on with insects and reptiles. It sits at Teluk Bahang in the northwest, near the national park.

A seafront promenade on the north shore whose hawker centre lights up at dusk. Reclaimed land now separates the promenade from the waves, so the sea now lies beyond a newer park. Tables are numbered, and you quote yours to each stall when you order.

Built in 1818 with Indian convict labour and widely called Southeast Asia's oldest Anglican church. White columns give it a Greek temple front, and a pavilion to Francis Light stands in the grounds. It caps a Harmony Street walk.