Georgetown travel review & recommendations by dare

Taking the overnight train from Kuala Lumpur to Buttorworth and then crossing on the ferry to Georgetown is an overnight trip hard to forget! But beware, not much is open in Georgetown in the morning and you might be best to book accomodation ahead to make sure they are open for your arrival.

We really enjoyed the Cheung Fatt Tze Mansion and their excellant UNESCO tour guide who explains the integration of chi and fengshui into Chinese Architecture. They do tours once or twice a day - make sure to come at the right time. However, they dont allow you to take photos inside. Its not budget but you can stay at the mansion too, I wish we had!

If you're big into architecture go also to the Pinang Peranakan Mansion which offers no tours but allows photographs inside.

Fort Cornwallis is a good place to stock up on local history and town is filled with fantastic architecture from colonial and ethnic roots.

Take the bus out to Penang Hill and ride the cable car up to the top. There are a number of temples and a small bird zoo which are neat to explore. We were lucky enough to see some wild gibbons in the bush along one of the roads, which are nice and quite to walk along and good for nature spotting; birds, insects etc. Watch out for the naughty macaques though!