Trishaw a firm favourite in the old part of George Town

Iconic draw: Tourists walking past a row of trishaws lining the Swenttenham Pier entrance
as the ‘Mein Schiff I’ berths for the day in the background.

GEORGE TOWN: The modernity of planes and cars has not rendered obsolete that old port city feel of Penang.

People still love to visit by ship and when they get here, they still want to use the trishaws, an icon of the island.

A whopping 22 cruise ships will be calling on Swettenham Pier this month alone and it has become almost a daily sight to see fleets of trishaws lining the pier entrance.

Trishaw fleet owner Saw Chin Choon said tour companies organising day trips for the passengers would book up to about 100 trishaw trips from him when the ships arrive.

“We take the passengers to Khoo Kongsi or the Peranakan Mansion, anywhere in the heritage hub that the tour companies organise. It is usually a two-hour excursion. We take the passengers out three times a day,” he said.

Saw added that his riders were booked all the way until March.

A Penang Port Sdn Bhd spokesman said the pier would see between 80,000 and 100,000 cruise ship passengers and crew members in December alone.

He said yesterday that Mein Schiff I and Superstar Gemini came from Singapore with a total of almost 4,000 passengers and crew.

“Every week, four to five cruise ships are calling and this doesn’t include Superstar Libra and Amusement World, which have their homeport here,” he said.

-thestar online.