Gurney Drive

What you gain

• ↑The Gurney Drive Hawker Centre is one of Southeast Asia's great food courts: a semi-covered complex with over 100 stalls covering every Penang hawker speciality — the char kway teow on the eastern end, Nyonya laksa along the central lane, and the best cendol (coconut milk shaved ice with palm sugar and green rice flour jelly) in the city at the corner stall near the main entrance.
• ↑The promenade between Gurney Drive and the Penang Botanic Gardens (a 20-minute walk) is the city's finest walk at sunset: the light over the Strait of Malacca toward Butterworth and the mainland is extraordinary on clear evenings, and the street food carts along the waterfront set up from 6pm.
• ↑Gurney Paragon mall has the best concentration of quality restaurants for those wanting something other than hawker food: The Mugshot Café for Western breakfast, Ferringhi Garden for Nyonya cuisine, and Kafé Khas for authentic Malay dishes in an air-conditioned setting.

What you sacrifice

• ↓Gurney Drive lacks the historic character and UNESCO ambiance of the Heritage Quarter: it's a modern Malaysian commercial strip with shopping malls and hotels, and it doesn't represent the Penang that most visitors come to experience.
• ↓Distance from the Heritage Quarter (about 3km) means a taxi or Grab ride to the street art, clan temples, and old-city hawker stalls — the two areas don't walk to each other easily in the heat.