Macau and Its Bridges
Macau really isn’t a very big city. Give yourself a few days, and you can cover its three main parts—the Peninsula, Taipa, and Coloane—on foot.
In the Peninsula’s historic center, the Portuguese flavor is impossible to miss, with Chinese and Latin cultures blending and coexisting. On Taipa’s Cotai Strip, life feels flashy, surreal, and drenched in excess. And if you get an early start for Coloane, welcome to a quiet little fishing village.
After visiting Macau several times over the years, going back and forth between the Peninsula and Cotai, I had somehow never paid much attention to the bridges stretching across the Lingdingyang waters. Then on my last trip, I had a sudden thought: could I walk across these bridges in Macau?
Macau currently has three sea-crossing bridges: the Macau-Taipa Bridge, the Friendship Bridge, and the Sai Van Bridge, each built in a different era. The oldest, the Macau-Taipa Bridge (also called the Governor Nobre de Carvalho Bridge), was completed in the 1970s and is now the only one you can cross on foot. Maybe that was because Macau was less developed back then, and not everyone owned a car, so a pedestrian walkway was deliberately included.
With the route decided, I picked an auspicious day to head out. The starting point for this city walk was The Londoner, Macau’s newest marquee hotel. Its facade imitates the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, making it look like a busy Victorian-era train station.
In daylight, the Cotai Strip sheds its neon-and-glamour outer layer and looks fairly ordinary. Because of the pandemic, there were very few tourists around, and the Venetian gondoliers were lazily gathered together with nothing to do.
A half-hour walk north brought us to a small artificial wetland. The man-made traces were obvious, but a natural landscape like this is precious in Macau.
A whole crowd of veteran photographers with long lenses had gathered on the platform. After chatting for a bit, I learned that black-faced spoonbills, egrets, and kingfishers appear in the wetland. They were all local birdwatchers who regularly come here to wait.
Today’s stars were two kingfishers. Apparently, you have to wait for hours to capture the moment when the pair cuddle up and feed each other. People can always summon remarkable enthusiasm and patience for the things they love.
It reminded me of a chance encounter last year in Hangzhou, where I met a group of people equally passionate about nature. I still vividly remember going into the hills at dawn with them to watch birds. Telling my Macau counterparts about those friends from Hangzhou gave me that wonderful feeling of finding kindred spirits far from home.
At the other end of the wetland is the Taipa Houses Museum: five century-old Portuguese-style buildings standing in a neat row, now open to the public as small museums and exhibition spaces.
Visiting a small museum like this feels effortless; there’s none of the fatigue that comes with confronting some giant institution. My favorite writer, Orhan Pamuk, once said he firmly defends small museums that reveal modern life. Their understated, intimate everyday objects let people look more closely at the stories of ordinary life as it once was.
Walking down the steps from the Taipa Houses, we even passed a shabby little roadside temple where people were still worshipping devoutly.
Following the side streets brought us to Rua do Cunha, a whole street of souvenir shops and viral snack spots. It was a good place to refuel, though I always feel those internet-famous stores offer poor value.
But in the side streets radiating out from Rua do Cunha, there are quite a few Portuguese restaurants tucked away. With their colorful facades and little houses, they feel like a hot afternoon in a Mediterranean seaside town.
Our goal was to cross Xiaotan Hill in urban Taipa. There isn’t much tourist information about it, which makes sense—who comes to Macau to go hiking? The hill isn’t high. You can either follow the road or take the trail up to the viewpoint.
Then suddenly, the Macau-Taipa Bridge appeared before us like a roller coaster, spanning the waters of Lingdingyang Bay.
Macau has an old place name, Mirror Sea. Borrowed here, “a rainbow over Mirror Sea” is also one of Macau’s iconic views.
The distant Lisboa always seems to add a touch of magic realism to a photo, no matter where you are.
Other than the Lisboa, the most eye-catching building on the opposite shore is MGM’s trio of colorful “shipping containers.”
I was a little reluctant to keep walking on the way down, but then I was surprised to discover that Macau had basically built an elevator right up the mountain. One button press took us down to street level, and when the elevator doors opened, the bridge entrance was right across the road.
Before walking the bridge, take special note: you need to walk facing traffic, in the opposite direction of the cars! There was a clear warning at the entrance, but I missed it, so all the photos below show the wrong direction. It’s a single lane each way, and overtaking is prohibited.
Macau’s buses and taxis come in colorful liveries that look great in photos from any distance. Looking back at the still images, they carry a bit of that old Hong Kong movie vibe.
But in reality, because I was walking the wrong way, I was pretty unnerved by the stream of cars roaring up behind me, large and small, while the strong wind blowing across the bay seemed to keep “trying to murder” me by shoving me toward the road.
The runners coming toward me smiled tolerantly at this reckless wrong-way intruder, though they were probably complaining about me nonstop in their heads.
Near the Peninsula end, the bridge rises and dips in arched slopes like a roller-coaster track. The cars beside me looked as if they were all about to launch straight into the sky toward the Lisboa.
A woman in a flowing dress walked toward me, and I couldn’t decide whether the scene belonged in a sci-fi film or a romance.
With lots of stopping and starting, it still took more than half an hour, including a little downhill jog. On the left was the Macau public bus company’s parking lot, packed tightly beneath Macau Tower like rows of little matchboxes.
Still not ready to call it a day, I turned right and kept walking. At the end were the Macao Science Center and the Museum of Art. The science center felt like one of the few places in Macau that is genuinely great for kids, with highly interactive exhibits throughout.
The pedestrian bridge from the science center to the art museum featured another eye-catching shipping-container design.
It’s only a short walk from the science center to Fisherman’s Wharf. Along the way, I noticed a building full of old European charm. I loved these kinds of balconies, and the feeling of sitting on one doing absolutely nothing but enjoying the breeze.
The reason this place stood out was that, from hotel guests to restaurant diners, every single person seemed to be Portuguese with distinctly Southern European features. It was probably the place in Macau with the highest “Portuguese concentration” I saw.
This was the first time I learned that Xian Xinghai was from Macau.
The city walk ended at Fisherman’s Wharf. During the pandemic, Fisherman’s Wharf felt bleak and deserted. With no one in the frame, the photos looked like they were taken on an urban-ruins exploration.
Related
City walk keywords: Taipa Houses-Museum, Taipa Grande Viewing Platform, Governador Nobre de Carvalho Bridge, Macao Science Center, Fisherman’s Wharf
Governador Nobre de Carvalho Bridge (Ponte Governador Nobre de Carvalho), also known as the Macau-Taipa Bridge, was the first cross-sea bridge connecting the Macau Peninsula and Taipa. It is 2,570 meters long and 9.2 meters wide.
Friendship Bridge (Ponte de Amizade), also known as the New Macau-Taipa Bridge, was the second cross-sea bridge connecting the Macau Peninsula and Taipa. It is also the longest of Macau’s three bridges, with a total length of 4,700 meters and a width of 18 meters.
Sai Van Bridge (Ponte de Sai Van) is the third cross-sea cable-stayed bridge connecting the Macau Peninsula and Taipa. It is 2,200 meters long and 28 meters wide. Its most distinctive design feature is its two 85-meter-high double-arched bridge towers, which represent the first letter “M” in Macau’s English and Portuguese names, the Roman numeral “III,” and the Arabic numeral “3.”
The Fourth Macau-Taipa Cross-Sea Bridge (Portuguese: Quarta Ponte Marítima Macau-Taipa), also known as the Fourth Crossing, is the fourth cross-sea route under construction between the Macau Peninsula and Taipa. Construction began in August 2020, and completion was expected in January 2024. The bridge has a total length of 3.085 kilometers and is Macau’s first dual four-lane cross-sea bridge.
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