Jakarta itinerary for first-timers

Kota Tua was Batavia, the headquarters of the Dutch East India Company in Asia. The walk in starts at Jakarta Kota, a working art deco railway station, and follows Jalan Lada to Fatahillah Square, the old town hall square. Its centrepiece is the former Batavia City Hall, built in the early 18th century and now the Jakarta History Museum, with the Wayang puppet museum and the Fine Arts and Ceramics museum on the sides of the square.

• Jakarta Kota Station
• Fatahillah Square
• Jakarta History Museum
• Wayang Museum
• Fine Arts and Ceramics Museum

Come early: the square is cooler and calmer in the morning, and the colourful rental bicycles appear as the day goes on.

A few minutes west of the square, the Kali Besar was the main canal of Batavia, lined with merchants' houses and warehouses. Its banks have been restored with walkways and seating, and the old façades along it, some grand and some crumbling, show the layers of colonial Jakarta better than any museum. Jalan Pintu Besar Utara leads south from here towards Chinatown.

• Kali Besar canal
• Colonial merchants' houses
• Jalan Kunir
• Jalan Pintu Besar Utara

Glodok grew outside the walls of Batavia after 1740 and has been the heart of Chinese-Indonesian Jakarta ever since. From Jalan Pancoran, narrow lanes lead into the market of Petak Sembilan, packed with fruit, dried goods, herbal medicine, incense and red lanterns, and close by stands the city's oldest Chinese temple, first founded in the 17th century. On the way back north, Asemka is a crowded wholesale market of toys, stationery and trinkets.

• Jalan Pancoran
• Petak Sembilan market
• Chinese temples
• Chandra Building
• Asemka market

This is the best part of the city for snacks: Chinese-Indonesian sweets, noodles and street food are sold all through the lanes.

Merdeka Square, one of the largest city squares in the world, is the symbolic centre of Indonesia. In its middle rises Monas, the National Monument, a tall white obelisk topped by a flame covered in gold, built to commemorate the struggle for independence. Inside its base is a museum of dioramas telling the country's history, and a lift climbs to a viewing deck over the city.

• Merdeka Square
• National Monument (Monas)
• Independence history museum
• Viewing deck

The square is huge and shadeless; arrive in the morning, carry water, and leave the walk to the mosque for when you have seen the monument.

On the north-east corner of the square, the Istiqlal Mosque is the largest in Southeast Asia, a vast modernist building of white marble and steel whose main prayer hall sits under a great dome ringed by galleries. Directly across the street stands the neo-Gothic Jakarta Cathedral, and the two facing each other are often described as a symbol of Indonesia's religious harmony.

• Istiqlal main prayer hall
• Dome and galleries
• Jakarta Cathedral

Dress modestly with shoulders and knees covered; visitors are guided around the mosque outside prayer times, and robes are lent at the entrance.

Just south of the monuments, Jalan H. Agus Salim, which everyone calls Jalan Sabang, is central Jakarta's best-known food street, lined with stalls, coffee shops and small eateries that fill up from late afternoon. It runs between the leafy colonial district of Menteng and the Sarinah building, Indonesia's first department store, on the main avenue.

• Jalan Sabang
• Jalan Wahid Hasyim
• Sarinah
• Menteng side streets

Come hungry and try a Jakarta dish here: soto Betawi, the coconut-milk beef soup, or kerak telor, the egg and rice omelette sold on the street.

Jalan Thamrin is the city's grand avenue, and at its centre is Bundaran HI, the Hotel Indonesia roundabout with the Welcome Monument and its fountain, surrounded by towers and the giant malls of Plaza Indonesia and Grand Indonesia. In the evening the roundabout is lit up and the pavements fill with office workers heading home, and the malls are where much of Jakarta spends its free time.

• Bundaran HI
• Welcome Monument
• Plaza Indonesia
• Grand Indonesia
• Thamrin City

On Sunday mornings Thamrin and Sudirman close to cars for the weekly car-free day, and the avenues fill with walkers, runners and cyclists.