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In fact, the festivities are fairly muted here, but the food is good. Northern-style Chinese cooking and glossy interiors.

Locals can’t get enough of the stewed goose intestines, though the less exotic roast goose with salt and pepper is a better bet.

Decent Cantonese food including good, cheapdimsum .

Deserves a mention for its glass atrium, quiet outdoor seating, terrific coffee and afternoon tea menus.

Traditional Sichuan food in a plain setting. The dan dan noodles are so delicious that customers are limited to just one serving.

Updated Northern Chinese classics in theatrically lit tower-top restaurant.

You can’t miss this place – two huge stone lions guard the front door. Deep-roasted crab and steamed abalone with orange crust rate highly.

A great stop for a pot of tea and some fruit jellies and lotus paste buns. The adventurous might try the bird’s nest and egg tarts or double boiled frog’s oviduct with coconut milk.

This place juts out over the water at Lei Yue Mun, offering delicious Chinese seafood dishes like shellfish cooked in spicy wine, and grilled king prawn.

A frosty oasis when the mercury soars, with a glass bar and stools to perch upon while you gaze out at the hot and harried shoppers elbowing each other along the Golden Mile.

Peking duck is the speciality, or try Yangzhou fried rice with ham and peas at this gently ageing, charming restaurant.

The Kowloon-Canton Railway, which now ends at Hung Hom, used to finish at this clocktower, as did the rather more famous Orient Express (see Clocktower). Plans are afoot to extend the KCR to Tsim Sha Tsui again by 2003 or thereabouts. From here, you can walk for more than a kilometre around the TST waterfront and marvel at the odd optimistic fisherman dangling a line in the harbour.

The small but pretty Bird Garden is where local folk, mostly elderly, take their birds to sing and get some fresh air. There’s also a small bird market here selling sparrows, finches and songbirds in elegant little cages. Fresh bird food, in the form of live grasshoppers, is fed to the birds through the cage bars with chopsticks.

Near the Bird Garden is a vibrant flower market, at its best and brightest in the morning. The stalls and shops lining the entire length of Flower Market Road sell a wide variety of exotic flowers – a wonderfully colourful sight and a good place to take photographs. The busy market is especially exciting to visit during the Chinese New Year.

The small, covered Jade Market is worth a quick forage even if you’re not intending to buy any jade. Dozens of stalls sell jewellery, small animals (many representing characters from the Chinese zodiac) and beads in jade. There will be few bargains on sale, particularly to those without a knowledge of good jade, but there’s plenty of cheap jade here if you just want to own some trinkets.

If you haven’t seen a Hong Kong produce market in full swing, you could do worse than wander down Reclamation Street. This predominantly fruit and vegetable market will provide some good photo opportunities. The squeamish, however, may want to avoid wandering inside the municipal wet market building where livestock is freshly slaughtered and expertly eviscerated on the spot.

Although it is one of the most famous Buddhist sites in Hong Kong, the Fat Jong Temple is little visited by foreigners. Making it well worth the journey to see is the striking colour scheme – with red pillars standing out from the white walls – ornate decorations and magnificent Buddha sculptures. The temple somehow manages to be be both busy and serene at the same time.

Quaint and tiny, Hau Wong is hardly worth a special trip, but take a look if you’re in the area. It was built in 1737 as a monument to the exiled boy-emperor Ping’s most loyal advisor. Usually fairly quiet unless a festival is in full swing.

The gloomy red and gold interior of the Man Mo Temple, dating back to the 1840s, is always thick with sandlewood smoke from the giant incense spirals hanging overhead, which take a couple of weeks to burn through. The temple is dedicated to two deities, Man (the god of literature) and Mo (the god of war). Some of the scenes from the film version of Richard Mason’s The World of Suzy Wong were filmed here.

Man Mo Temple

The Tin Hau temple in Yau Ma Tei is divided into three sections. Only one of these is actually devoted to Tin Hau, the sea goddess who is Hong Kong’s favourite deity and essentially its patron. Admittedly, it is neither the oldest nor grandest temple in the territory, but pretty nonetheless. The other two sections are dedicated to Shing Wong, the god of the city and To Tei, the god of the earth. Officially no photography is allowed inside the temple. English-speaking visitors should head for a couple of stalls at the far end of the temple, where they can have their fortunes told in English.

Quiet lane near Yau Ma Tei’s Tin Hau Temple

A noisy, colourful affair, Wong Tai Sin is always crowded and aswirl with incense smoke. Legend holds that Wong Tai Sin (originally known as Huang Chu-ping), who was born in Zhejiang Province around AD 328, could see the future and make wishes come true. The temple opened in 1921, after a Taoist priest brought a sacred portrait of Huang to Hong Kong. Its vivid, stylised architecture contrasts sharply with the surrounding concrete boxes. Worshippers from the three main Chinese religions – Taoism, Buddhism and Confucianism – flock here, not to mention 100-odd soothsayers hawking their services. Find out for yourself if they are as accurate as Huang. Behind the temple is an ancient and mysterious tomb that still baffles historians.

Smoky offerings

It is said that not a single nail was used in the construction of this lavish replica of a traditional Tang Dynasty (AD 618–907) place of worship. The nunnery opened in 2000, funded by donations from wealthy families, whose names are inscribed under the roof tiles. Few original structures survived the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, so this is a rare chance to see the ingenuity of ancient Middle Kingdom architecture. There are also impressive statues of the Sakyamuni Buddha, ornate gardens and gently whispering waterfalls, and the underlying hum of the chanting, shaven-headed nuns.

Chi Lin Nunnery complex

This strip that stretches up Nathan Road from the waterfront could be more accurately dubbed the “neon mile”. It’s less glitzy than Central and comprises mainly bars, restaurants, tailors, camera and electronic shops and the odd desultory topless bar. The crowds are so great that walking the Golden Mile becomes a major challenge.

History is visible in the ruler-straight line of Boundary Street, which marked the border between British Hong Kong and China between 1860 and 1898. The lower part of the Kowloon Peninsula was ceded (supposedly in perpetuity) by China to the British, who wanted extra land for army training and commerce. The British then became worried over water shortages and wanted yet more land to protect Hong Kong Island from the threat of bombardment from newly invented long-range artillery. In 1898 the border was moved again to include the entire New Territories, this time on a 99-year lease (see 1898: The 99-Year Lease).

One of Hong Kong’s most picturesque parks began life in 1847 as a Chinese fort. A legal oversight by the British left the fort under Chinese control after the New Territories were leased to Britain. It was levelled during World War II, and a labyrinthine ghetto called the Walled City sprang up in its place. This bizarre place quickly became a magnet for triads, drug dealers, heroin addicts, pornographers and rats the size of small dogs (see New Kowloon). It was pulled down in 1992 and replaced by the park. A display of photographs in the almshouse near the entrance tells the story.

Maze, Kowloon Walled City Park

While in TST, if you feel one more whisper of “Copy watch? Tailor?” may provoke you to irrational violence, then venture through the park gates, find a well-shaded bench and watch the world go by. There’s a big swimming pool (reputed to be something of a gay cruising zone), an aviary and a pond featuring flamingos and other aquatic birdlife.

The whole area around Shanghai and Reclamation streets is a traditional Chinese neighbourhood, if somewhat less vibrant and seedier than it was a few years ago. Interesting nooks and shops include funeral parlours, herbalists, health tea shops, paper kite shops and, at 21 Ning Po Street, a shop selling pickled snakes.

Kitchen utensils shop, Shanghai Street

The Han burial tomb (AD 24– 220) can barely be seen through a scratched sheet of perspex. Still, it’s one of Hong Kong’s earliest surviving historical monuments, so act impressed.

One of the best places to view this fascinating natural landmark is, conveniently, from outside Wong Tai Sin temple. Find the open area near the fortune tellers’ stalls where you can look straight up at what from this angle resembles the grizzled head of a male lion. Those feeling energetic may be tempted to scale its heights. Take lots of water, and be warned – the top section is not for the faint-hearted.

Hong Kong Island’s northeast is the region’s administrative centre. Colonial remnants and exciting modern architecture stand next to each other around Statue Square (see Central’s Statue Square).

Kowloon is at its most atmospheric at night. Head up the peninsula to the narrow lanes of Yau Ma Tei for some serious haggling (see Temple Street Night Market).

Ignore the subterranean road and rail links between Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. The thrilling way to cross the water is on the Star Ferry (see Star Ferry).

Take the tram to the lofty heights of Victoria Peak for an amazing view of the city (see The Peak).

An old fort steeped in colonial history and reminders of World War II, Stanley on the Southside of Hong Kong Island is a peaceful diversion from the frenetic city (see Stanley).

Some fascinating interactive displays here if you don’t mind fighting your way through the giggling, pushing throngs of schoolchildren. There are enough buttons to push, gadgets to grapple with and levers to tweak to satisfy even the most hard-to-please kids. Basic principles of chemistry, physics, biology and other sciences are explained but in a much more entertaining and less dry manner than in the classroom.

When you’ve had enough of history, come and peek into the future. This odd-looking dome in the heart of Tsim Sha Tsui includes an omnimax theatre and interactive exhibits such as the jetpack ride.