The streets that drop from Fort Orange to the harbour are lined with the houses that European merchants, mainly Dutch and English, built for themselves in the 18th and 19th centuries. Stuccoed facades, deep verandahs, louvred shutters, and the occasional date stone — the architecture is recognisable from old Cape Town or Paramaribo, transplanted to the equatorial coast.
Most of the houses are in poor condition. Some are still lived in, others have been gutted by damp and termites. There is no preservation programme of any seriousness; the value is in walking through a working neighbourhood that happens to be wrapped in the bones of a vanished colonial bourgeoisie. Go in the morning before the heat builds.