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Coloane Island South
Translated from the Chinese, hác-sá means "black sand," although the sands of the area's biggest beach are actually a deep gray. Even if you don't stay at the Grand Coloane Beach Resort, you can use the public sports complex here for a daily fee (MOP$500 adults; MOP$250 children 3–16): it's equipped with indoor and outdoor swimming pools, tennis courts, Jacuzzi, steam room, sauna, and more. Other facilities include playgrounds, picnic areas, restaurants, barbecue facilities, boat rentals, and water-sports outfitters.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Open 24 hours
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Downtown
This impressive re-creation documents the important role that pawnshops have played in Macau for hundreds of years.
396 Av. Almeida Ribeiro, Macau, n/a Macau, Macau
Sight Details
Rate Includes: MOP$5, Daily 10:30–7; closed 1st Mon. of month
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Downtown
The cream-and-white interior of one of Macau's most beautiful churches takes on a heavenly golden glow when illuminated for services. St. Dominic's was originally a convent founded by Spanish Dominican friars in 1587. In 1822 China's first Portuguese newspaper, The China Bee, was published here, and the church became a repository for sacred art in 1834 when convents were banned in Portugal. Admission to all churches and temples is free, though donations are suggested.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Daily 10–6
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Downtown
One of Macau's three oldest churches, the Church of St. Lawrence was founded by Jesuits in 1560 and has been lovingly rebuilt several times. Its present appearance dates from 1846. It overlooks the South China Sea amid pleasant, palm-shaded gardens. Families of Portuguese sailors used to gather on the front steps to pray for the sailors' safe return; hence its Chinese name, Feng Shun Tang (Hall of the Soothing Winds). Focal points of its breathtaking interior are the elegant wood carvings, striking stained glass windows, a baroque altar, and crystal chandeliers.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Daily 10–5
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Downtown
Built in the pattern of traditional Portuguese squares, St. Augustine Square is paved with black-and-white tiles laid out in mosaic wave patterns and lined with leafy overhanging trees and lots of wooden benches. It's easy to feel as if you're in a European village, far from South China. One of the square's main structures is the Teatro Dom Pedro V, a European-style hall with an inviting green-and-white facade built in 1859. It's an important cultural landmark for the Macanese and was regularly used until World War II, when it fell into disrepair. The 300-seat venue once again hosts concerts and recitals—especially during the annual Macau International Music Festival—as well as important public events, the only times you can go inside. It does, however, have a garden that's open daily, and admission is free. Igreja de Santo Agostinho (Church of St. Augustine), to one side of the square, dates from 1591, and has a grand, weathered exterior and a drafty interior with a high turquoise-colored wood-beam ceiling (open daily 10–6). There's a magnificent stone altar with a statue of Christ on his knees, bearing the cross, with small crucifixes in silhouette on the hill behind him. The statue, called Our Lord of Passos, is carried in a procession through the streets of downtown on the first day of Lent.
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Recommended Fodor’s Video
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Downtown
Built in 1592, the Temple of the Lotus honors several Buddhist and Taoist deities, including Tin Hau (goddess of the sea), Kun Iam (goddess of mercy), and Kwan Tai (god of war and wealth). The front of the temple is embellished with magnificent clay bas-reliefs of renowned figures from Chinese history and mythology. Inside are several halls, shrines, and courtyards. The temple is best known as a lodging place for Mandarins traveling from Guangdong Province. Its most famous guest was Commissioner Lin Zexu, whose confiscation and destruction of British opium in 1839 was largely responsible for the First Opium War.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Daily 7–5
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Downtown
These beautiful gardens were built in the 19th century by a Chinese merchant named Lou Kau. Rock formations, water, vegetation, pavilions, and sunlight were all carefully considered, and the balanced landscapes are the hallmark of Suzhou garden style. The government took possession and restored the grounds in the mid 1970s, so that today you can enjoy tranquil walks among delicate flowering bushes framed with bamboo groves and artificial hills. A large auditorium frequently hosts concerts and other events, most notably recitals during the annual Macau International Music Festival. Adjacent to the gardens, a European-style edifice contains the Macau Tea Culture House, a small museum with exhibits on the tea culture of Macau and China (Closed Mon.).
10 Estrada de Adolfo Loureiro, Macau, n/a Macau, Macau
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Free, Daily 6–9
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Outer Harbour
The large, boxy museum is as well-known for its curving, rectangular framed roof as it is for its calligraphy, painting, ceramics, and photography exhibitions. It's Macau's only fully dedicated art museum, with five floors of eastern and western works, plus international partnerships with museums in China, including Beijing's Palace Museum and the Shanghai Museum. .
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Free, Closed Mon., Tues.–Sun. 10–6:30
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Outer Harbour
This sprawling complex of rides, games, and other minor attractions has a Disney-esque vibe. The centerpiece is the Roman Amphitheatre, which hosts outdoor performances, but the main draws are the lively themed restaurants on the west side. Come for the food, and stay after dark, as Fisherman's Wharf is most active at night.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Admission free; games from MOP$1, Open 24 hours
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Taipa
After Dr. Stanley Ho bought the Macau Jockey Club (MJC) in 1991, he transformed what was a quiet trotting track into a lucrative high-stakes racing facility. However, horse racing is now a more retro gambling option in Asia's rising casino hotspot of Macau, and the local MJC pales in comparison to the truly world-class Hong Kong Jockey Club. Nonetheless the MJC continues to operate year-round, hosting more than 100 races and entertaining a majority of local middle-aged men, along with some younger spectators who come to see the horses close up in between races. If you're game, you can place bets at a number of stations throughout Macau and Hong Kong, as well as by phone and online.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: MOP$20
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Inner Harbour
Looking like a ship, with jutting white slats and porthole windows, this handsome building across from the A-Ma temple is a great place to spend an interesting hour brushing up on seafaring history. A row of fountains out front soothes you almost as much as the calm, cool interior. Multimedia exhibits cover fishermen, merchants, and explorers from Portugal, South China, and Japan. Look for compasses, telescopes, and sections of ships. There's even a small aquarium gallery with local sealife. Try your hand at astronomic navigation—which sailors have used for thousands of years—by looking up at the top floor's nifty celestial dome ceiling.
1 Largo do Pagode da Barra, Macau, n/a Macau, Macau
Sight Details
Rate Includes: MOP$10 ($5 Sun.), Wed.–Mon. 10–5:30
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Downtown
A stylish part of Macau's gambling scene offers lavish lounges, Dale Chihuly glass sculptures, Portuguese-inspired architecture, and fine dining. The gambling floor itself is popular with high rollers from Hong Kong, including business tycoons who are just in for a few days. One of the owners, Pansy Ho, is the daughter of Macau's "gambling godfather," Dr. Stanley Ho; she is a high-octane business professional in her own right and a woman's classy touch shows up in this place's glitz-and-glam energy and high-society appeal.
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Taipa
Not only is the hotel run by Altira, a homegrown luxury brand, a stellar place to rest your head, but its on-site Mocha gaming parlor is one of Taipa's classiest. Facing the glow of casinos to the peninsula's north, it offers swank, '70s-style gaming floors decked out in browns and taupes with mod chandeliers. Though you can find a broad selection of games in the Altira's own casino, Mocha is devoted to slot machines. VIP resort suites, fine-dining, and the rooftop 38 Lounge add to the overall ambience.
Av. de Kwong Tung, Macau, n/a Macau, Macau
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Taipa
In a quiet area of town, Asian-inspired Nirvana has rooms decorated in eastern themes. Therapists from Thailand and the Philippines are trained in deep-tissue, ayurvedic, herbal, shiatsu, and aromatherapy massages.
522-526 Av. dos Jardins do Oceano, Macau, n/a Macau, Macau
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Inner Harbour
In the swinging seaside days of the 1950s, Macau's western port, or Ponte 16, is where all the action was. When the eastern port opened in the mid-1960s, the area fell into decay, but with the 2008 opening of Ponte 16, this legendary Latin Quarter has seen new momentum. The resort-casino has attracted Hong Kong and Taiwanese pop stars, mainland mass-market gamblers, and VIPs from Beijing and Shanghai. Probably because of the relatively isolated location, the atmosphere tends to be casual, and you can expect a winning combination of gorgeous views of the Inner Harbour as well as 109 gaming tables and 300-plus slot machines.
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Taipa
The region's largest temple is part of a functioning monastery with several dozen monks. The classically designed structure has an ornate main prayer hall and central pavilions with sculptures, fish ponds, and banyan trees. Monks tend the vegetable plots that supply the popular onsite vegetarian restaurant. It's best to have your concierge write down the address before you go, as this monastery is a little bit off the beaten track.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Free, Restaurant closed Sun., Daily 9–5
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Inner Harbour
The elegant yellow-and-white building with Moorish architectural influences built onto a slope of Barra Hill is the Moorish Barracks. It now houses the Macau Maritime Administration but was originally constructed in 1874 for Indian police regiments brought into the region, a reminder of Macau's historic relationship with the state of Goa. Although the barracks are not open to the public, visitors can tour the ornamented veranda.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Free, Daily 9–6
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Downtown
This huge hotel, shopping, and casino complex opened across the street from the Venetian Macao in 2012: its jungle-themed shopping center is flanked by the Holiday Inn Macao, the Conrad Macao, and the Sheraton Macao Hotel. The whole thing is perhaps the most child-friendly of the resort complexes, with budget-friendly prices, children's pools, and an array of colorful family suites. The enormous 3,863-room Sheraton—the largest in the world—even offers free popcorn and games near reception.
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Downtown
Founded in 1569 by Dom Belchior Carneiro, Macau's first bishop, the Macau Holy House of Mercy is the China coast's oldest Christian charity, and it continues to take care of the underprivileged with a welfare shop and low-rent housing. It also operates a nursery, a house for the elderly and a center for the blind. The exterior of the heritage-listed building is neoclassical, but the interior is done in a contrasting opulent, modern style. The second floor houses a museum of Roman Catholic relics and also displays portraits of its earliest benefactors, including Martha Merop.
2 Travessa da Misericordia, Macau, n/a Macau, Macau
Sight Details
Rate Includes: MOP$5, Tues.–Sun. 10–1 and 2:30–5:30
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Coloane Island West
This large park has extensive gardens, ponds, and waterfalls, and a large walk-in aviary with more than 200 bird species chirping and flying about. There are lots of things of interest to children, including playgrounds, a mini zoo, and an interactive museum with exhibits on nature and agriculture.
Sight Details
Rate Includes: Daily 8–6
