Padang

A day and a night in Padang from Batang Arau to Air Manis beach

Padang fills a day and a night. Walk the old trading quarter on the Batang Arau river, with Dutch warehouses and fishing boats, through Pondok, the Chinatown, then cross the Siti Nurbaya Bridge and climb Gunung Padang; end at Air Manis beach and the Malin Kundang stone at sunset.

Start the morning in the old trading quarter on the Batang Arau river, where Dutch-era warehouses and Chinese shophouses line the bank and fishing boats unload by the bridge. Walk through Pondok, Padang's Chinatown, for its temple and coffee shops, then cross the Siti Nurbaya Bridge and climb the steps of Gunung Padang for a view back over the river mouth.

Late morning, take a car to the Adityawarman Museum, housed in a traditional rumah gadang with a buffalo-horn roof, and then to the Grand Mosque of West Sumatra on Jalan Khatib Sulaiman. The Masjid Raya Ganting, one of the oldest mosques in Indonesia, is a quieter contrast if you prefer history to scale.

After a long lunch at a rumah makan Padang, drive south over the hill to Air Manis. The beach is home to Batu Malin Kundang, a rock in the shape of a kneeling man, and at low tide you can walk out to the little island of Pisang Kecil. Return to town for sunset on Taplau, then finish with dinner in Pondok when the night stalls open.

With an extra day, hire a boat for Sikuai Island or the clear water around Bungus Bay.

Rendang, sate Padang and ordering at a rumah makan

At a rumah makan in Padang, the waiter stacks a dozen small plates on your table, and the bill counts only the dishes you touched. Rendang, beef slow-cooked in coconut and spices, is the centrepiece; also try sate Padang in thick yellow or red sauce. Each person gets rice, and dishes are shared.

Eating nasi Padang in Padang works differently from the versions elsewhere. Sit down, and the waiter stacks a dozen small plates across your table without asking. Eat what you like; the bill counts only the dishes you touched, so leave the rest untouched.

Rendang is the centrepiece: beef simmered for hours in coconut milk and spices until the sauce is almost gone and the meat is dark and dry. Try also ayam pop, chicken boiled in coconut water and briefly fried, which is pale and mild beside the curries, plus dendeng balado, thin crisp beef under a heap of red chilli. Gulai curries of fish, jackfruit or offal fill the rest of the table.

Outside the rumah makan, look for sate Padang, beef skewers drowned in a thick yellow curry sauce with ketupat rice cakes, sold from evening carts around the city. Soto Padang is a clear spicy broth with crisp fried beef and vermicelli, best at breakfast.

For snacks, buy keripik balado, cassava crisps coated in sweet chilli, from the shops that line the main roads, and try teh talua, a frothy tea whisked with egg yolk. Pondok's night stalls are the best place to graze.

Mentawai surf, Tabuik in Pariaman and the ride up to Bukittinggi

Padang is the jumping-off point for three trips: the Mentawai Islands, with famous surf breaks and the biggest swell from about April to October; Pariaman, up the coast, where the Tabuik festival marks the Islamic month of Muharram; and Bukittinggi in the cool highlands, about two hours up the Anai valley.

The first is the Mentawai Islands, a chain of jungle islands off the coast with some of the most famous surf breaks in the world. Boats leave from Padang for Siberut and Tua Pejat; the main season for big, consistent swell runs roughly April to October, and most surfers join a charter or a camp booked in advance. Rough seas can cancel crossings, especially from October to December, when the city gets close to 500 mm of rain a month.

Second is Pariaman, about an hour north by road, or two hours on the slow Sibinuang local train. Each year on the tenth of Muharram in the Islamic calendar it stages Tabuik, a festival in which towering decorated effigies are carried through the streets and thrown into the sea; the date moves about eleven days earlier each year.

Third, and most popular, is the climb into the highlands. The road to Bukittinggi runs about two hours up the Anai valley, past a waterfall right beside the road, to a cooler town near the Sianok canyon. Many people stay up there and treat Padang as the arrival and departure point, which works well, but leave yourself one evening in the city for the food.