Old Phuket Town
Sino-Portuguese streets, cafés, street art and the Sunday Walking Street

The appeal of Old Phuket Town is that it is compact and rewarding to walk — not so big that it tires you out, but with plenty to look at. On a weekday morning the streets are still quiet and the light is soft, so you can photograph the Sino-Portuguese facades and Soi Romanee without the crowds, duck into a heritage café for coffee, then hunt down the murals. Come Sunday evening, Thalang Road closes for the Lard Yai Walking Street, people pour out to eat and listen to music. The area suits travellers who want a break from the beach and to explore a town on foot, without a complicated plan.

• 1
  For a day off the beach

  Culture day · walkable · easy

  If you have done a few days of beaches and islands and want a change, the old town is a tidy half-day. It is easy to walk, hard to get lost in, and shows you a side of Phuket that isn't the sea. For more of the island's sights, read Phuket's top attractions.

• 2
  For photography and cafés

  Photo spots · cafés · street art

  Soi Romanee, the pastel facades on Thalang and the murals are a treat for photographers, with heritage cafés to break the walk along the way. Come a little early for soft light and fewer people. See the picks in Old Phuket Town cafés.

• 3
  For Phuket's local food

  Hokkien mee · local food · markets

  The old town is the best place to eat Phuket's own dishes — Hokkien mee, lobak, o-aew — at shops that have been open for decades, plus a whole street of food on Sunday evening. See what to order in the Phuket food guide.

• 4
  For history and culture

  Heritage · Peranakan · mansions

  If you like the story behind a place, the area tells the tin-mining era and the Baba-Peranakan culture well, with ang mo lao mansions and small museums set inside old buildings you can go into. Reading the signs as you walk makes it far more interesting.

From the late 19th to the early 20th century, Phuket grew rich on tin mining, which drew large numbers of Hokkien Chinese labourers and traders to work and settle. Many married locally, and out of that came the Baba-Peranakan culture (men are Baba, women Nyonya) — a blend of Chinese, Thai and Malay food, dress, language and homes, the same cultural family as the Peranakans of Penang and Malacca.

The buildings you see in the old town are Sino-Portuguese: a Hokkien Chinese shophouse structure dressed in European/Portuguese decorative detail brought in via Penang and Malacca. The easy thing to spot is the ngor kah kee (五脚基, the five-foot way) — the covered walkway across the shopfronts that shelters you from sun and rain. The shophouses are deep and narrow, with a light-well in the middle, and the grand mansions of the mining families are the ang mo lao ("Westerner's building"). Once you know what to look for, watch the plasterwork, shutters and floor tiles as you walk and you'll start seeing detail you would have missed.

If your trip is about cafés, local food and the old-town atmosphere, staying in Phuket Town near the old quarter is convenient — you step straight out to eat and explore. There are guesthouses inside the Sino-Portuguese shophouses and small hotels styled to match. But if the trip is mainly about the sea, basing yourself on a beach like Patong, Kata or Karon and giving the old town a half-day is the better call. Because Phuket has no mass transit, staying near whatever you'll do most saves a lot of travel time.