Macau is a small piece of land with an outsized past, and the old peninsula is where it is most visible. Portuguese traders settled here in the sixteenth century, and the city stayed under Portuguese administration until 1999. Its centre still has the feel of a Mediterranean town transplanted to the coast of China, with pastel colonial houses, wave-patterned pavements and the Largo do Senado, a square of cream and yellow buildings with a fountain in the middle.
The facade of the church of St Paul stands a short walk uphill. It is all that remains of a Jesuit church, built in the early seventeenth century and destroyed by fire in 1835, and its carved granite front, with saints, angels and a dragon, climbs up a broad stone stair. Just beyond, the Guia Fortress and its lighthouse, built in the nineteenth century, look out over the city from a hill, the oldest lighthouse on the China coast.
The peninsula is crowded and the streets are narrow. Traffic keeps to the left, and scooters and motorbikes are everywhere. With over 500,000 people in a very small area, fuel and food are never far away, and an egg tart from a bakery in the old streets is a must. Big casino towers now dominate the skyline, and their neon lights brighten the evening. Still, the lanes behind the main squares are quiet, and an hour of wandering among the shuttered houses and temples is a delight.
The weather is hot and humid in summer, with typhoons in late summer, and a mild, dry winter. Spring and autumn are the best seasons, and weekdays are far calmer than weekends, when visitors from the mainland fill every pavement. Walk uphill in the cool of the evening, past the old church facade and the stalls selling almond biscuits, and look back over the roofs to the harbour lights.