Day 1 Victoria Peak May 13
The Air Canada flight from Vancouver landed in Hong Kong about 1/2 hour early at 4:45 local time.
Immigration and customs were cleared without incident, bags in hand we exited into the arrival hall.
We were greeted by a enormous ginger cat exhibit, about 8m long. Tail, ears and paws subtly move, amazing.
I look forward to seeing first hand how the cycle of civilization has rotated. All my existence it has been said that "The West" has been the "First World" the rest of the planet 2nd and 3rd. The last number of years have made some of us skeptical of this claim. My two visits to India showed me that India is rising fast, manufactures everything, and is already a top 5 economy heading to the top in the next 20 years. China also manufactures everything and is already the second largest economy. The US, the biggest economy is heavily weighted to the financial sector and of course the military industrial complex. Not exactly stuff that actually creates wealth. Manufacturing in the west has dwindled the last 3 decades in favor of imports from low cost labour countries. Canada is far behind, not even in the top 10. The vital infrastructure in Canada, the US and UK is aging and crumbling. Not even able to supply water effectively in Calgary. Apparently not a priority for buying votes it seems. China has reportedly made a massive "great leap forward" but this time not a unmitigated disaster with the unnecessary deaths of millions as under Mao in the prior great leap of the 1950s/60s. Looking forward to observing the reality on the ground.
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| Airport Express |
We took the Airport Express train to Central, then the Island line to Causeway Bay and a short walk to the Park Lane Autograph Marriot hotel.
A quick turn around and we set out to meet Eric and Virgina for Dim Sum at 'Dim Sum Library' in Pacific Place. It was a pleasant, flat hour walk from hotel, along Hennessy Road, then very difficult to navigate to locat restaurant in mall(I struggled with Google maps).
We were a bit late but eventually located the venue. Dim Sum was fabulous! So many tastes. Not awake enough to take any photos.
Nicely fed, Eric then drove us up to Victoria Peak.
Victoria peak is a delight to explore, the views of the city are spectacular. Laid out below one sees the amazing scale of development on this island and Kowloon. Seems indeed to be the first world!
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A pint of beer at the over a century old Peak Lookout restaurant concluded our mountain top visit. Eric dropped us off near the Star Ferry terminal as we imagined a boat ride to Kowloon to view the evening lights.
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| Peak Lookout |
At ferry we realized that we were done for the day, the travel had caught up. A cab back to Causeway Bay, a beer at the hopping rooftop bar while enjoying the nighttime view of the city and back to the room to crash.
Day 2 Kennedy Town - Central - Kowloon May 14
We are on our own today. Enjoyed breakfast at the Paterson street Causeway Cafe de Coral. Decent food at a reasonable price.
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| Cafe de Coral Breakfast |
We enjoyed cappuccino's, pineapple bun, toast, scrambled egg, vermicelli, "luncheon meat" (spam?), ham and noodles in soup. All in for less than $100 HKD. Excellent value and very tasty.
There are old style electric street cars (Trams) that run on Hennessey street and others, pretty much the length of the Island. We planned to use this excellent, low speed efficient mode of transport.
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| Electric Tram |
This adventure started poorly, we were apparently looking lost as we approached the tram. A much older than me man asked where we were going, we said Kennedy Town, he said we should go in the opposite direction, and that there are several end points. We need to select a Tram unit with Kennedy Town as its terminus. Then he said do you not know how to use your handheld? Haha…
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| % Cappuccino |
At Kennedy Town we found the "%" coffee shop, a $56 each coffee at “%” was very much enjoyed on the nearby Belcher Bay Promenade.
We tried to find, but could not locate the cut in half apple / ‘Blooming Bud’ at the MTR station? I asked a local selling stuff, he had not heard of it? Left without seeing more than a photo. AI later told me it was removed in 2023, for cleaning but had been returned. When pressed AI acknowledged that it was still in MTR storage.
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| Belcher Bay |
We then took Tram back to Central and enjoyed a brisket and wonton lunch at Mak’s, excellent fare, advertised with some puffery as best in the world.
Very good but not Alberta beef quality. We observed the Central mid-level Escalator system, at 800m the longest, outdoor covered one on the planet, but we did not ride on it.
A rainy afternoon and it was travelling up, did not want to descend on wet streets.
We walked to Central station and caught a train under harbour to Kowloon where I found my navigating skills seemed to again have fled…
About an hour was spent lost in its morass, frustrating and aimless wandering inside and out of the station/shopping mall trying to locate the bus terminal. Eventually, had to ask a few folks(I know, how embarrassing) and located the #95 bus and went to the Mong Kok area. Exiting the bus we were on the most crowded sidewalk I have ever been on. A reminder we are in the fourth most densely populated country on earth. We walked a few blocks to the Ladies Market outdoor shopping area.
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| Mong Kok Ladies Market |
We walked to the Jordan Temple Street Night Market, struggled through a Blue Girl Pilsener 640ml bottle.
German origin beer, brewed in South Korea, market leader in Hong Kong for the last 18 years. Go figure, no Tsing Tao on the menu?
Like India, not a beer culture. The Night Market is an interesting place, a sign selling "toys" and ladies dressed in "advertising" garb gives away the prior major, and apparently still active business of the area...
We caught the #3 bus on Nathan Road to Tsim Sha Tsui near the ferry port. A decidedly higher end area, Rodeo Drive comes to mind. All the high end name brand shops were represented. Very elegantly dressed patrons... Significant contrast to Temple Street.
A short walk from bus to ferry port where we enjoyed the evening light show on the building across the harbour. Many folks gathered for the nightly display. The light show was excellent, ferry across to Island very efficient and provided another view of the lights.
On debarking the ferry a beautiful young lady asked to and took a selfie of me with her… I guess my friend from Calgary was correct when he said that my beard might attract attention in China and that I should charge a fee… I did not charge her and regretted not taking my own selfie… oh well…Found a cab nearby and were soon back to Causeway Bay and bed.
It should be noted that most signs in Hong Kong are in English and Chinese and most locals speak at least some English.
Day 3 Tai O May 15
Another Cafe de Coral breakfast, different stuff but again very good. Eric and Virginia picked us up at 8:30 and drove us to Lantau island where we parked at the airport maĺl and took a bus across to the west side of the island to Tai O. Tai O has been called the "Venice of the East".
Once a major Tanaka fishing community, now reinvented as a tourist town. Most of the houses are built on stilts above the tide line. The residents attempt to maintain the old quiet lifestyle while being overrun most days with tourists. Commercial trawling was banned in 2012, an artisan fishery remains. The fishermen supply local restaurants and make shrimp paste. We were there reasonably early in the morning, not on a weekend so it was not very busy with visitors.
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Tai O Seafood |
A fresh crab and some fish were chosen from the catch laid out by a local vendor to be our lunch later.
We then walked around the area admiring the obvious strong sense of community.
Many fine cats were seen along the way (so obviously a good day).
At lunch our fish purchases were delivered to our restaurant and expertly prepared for us, along with a few other food selections.
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| Crab, Fish and Calamari feast |
The fresh crab was so amazingly delicious, and the fish was excellent although the smaller one was a bit overcooked. Calamari also as good as it gets
After lunch we walked a few shops down and got some dessert, Tai O donuts that were fresh from the fryer, very light( not like a doughnut), and also shared a fresh mango wrapped in glutinous rice which was also tasty.
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| Rice wrapped Mango |
Mangoes are in season so they are quite yummy. We took our desserts to the restaurant/coffee shop next door and had coffees.
Even though it was suggested that we shouldn’t bring in outside food, they brought us a knife so that we could cut the mango dessert into 4 pieces.
After that snack we walked along the shoreline road to a hotel which was housed in what was a British police barracks built in 1902.
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| Funicular Elevator |
It’s now a beautifully restored building, reinvented as a hotel and restaurant with wonderful landscaping. To get to the upper level we took a funicular elevator, a unique mode of transportation.
On the walk back to the bus we saw people digging for clams, the tide had gone out. We took the bus back into the city and picked up the car .
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| Tai O Street Art |
We had parked at an outlet mall that this morning was quiet and deserted but now was teeming with Friday afternoon shoppers - mostly high school kids it seemed. Then back to our hotel. It was a long day but very enjoyable seeing a historical part of Hong Kong. Off to Macau tomorrow once we figure out the transportation (we’re on our own tomorrow). Today it rained quite a bit in the afternoon but we had our umbrella so not a problem.
Day 4 Macau May 16
Today we went to Macau. Got up reasonably early and reloaded the octopus pass and picked up light breakfast at Wellcome.
Caught A11 bus at 6:45 a block from the hotel for an approximately 1 hour ride to the airport/ bridge bus terminal.
Cleared immigration with passport check and photo. Purchased a bus ticket for $33hkd and at 8AM got on the cross border bus to Macau. Because it was quite windy today we decided not to take the ferry to avoid the risk of motion sickness.
A good decision as there were white caps on the water and the bus was restricted to a slower speed driving over.
The bridge/tunnel from Hong Kong to Macau is amazing, length is 55 km long across the channel. The buses and ferries run 24 hours between Hong Kong and Macau, no doubt in case the urge to gamble is overwhelming.
The bus terminal in Macau is huge and cavernous . After going through immigration and customs we exited and found the taxi queue. We were going to the main tourist area at Senado square.
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| Senado Square |
The cab driver pretended he didn’t know where that was. I had to use Google Maps on my handheld phone to show him. It was painful - the driver kept having to check where he was going. We finally got there, $100hkd for a 5km ride.
We wandered around the area for a bit looking for a coffee shop. There are a lot of high end shops around and we walked by a Swatch store that had a massive lineup outside and guards lined up at the entrance. We spoke with a person in the square who said Swatch was releasing a limited edition watch today and that some people had lined up overnight. She said that most likely they’d be buying and then reselling for much more. We did not join the lineup.
Apparently the authorities were taking no chances of any incidents, we saw two armed Police with automatic weapons come by near the Swatch store.
We did not find a coffee shop on this foray but did find a place for breakfast and had Hong Kong milk tea, I had pork chop and eggs (fired according to the menu) and Elaine had a bacon bun, all quite satisfying.
We then walked to the Ruins of the 17th century Portuguese St. Paul’s college and church which is a big and busy tourist attraction. I was stopped not once but twice by gentlemen wanting to take a selfie with me. The beard is a bit of a locals attraction. This time I also took selfies.
We walked past some sections of ruins of the city walls of Macau from the 16th century. Not much to that my mother-in-law Joyce would have said.
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| Guli Coffee |
It was raining quite a bit as we walked around the area, a Starbucks was ram-jam full so we continued on. We found a small coffee shop called
Guli after
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| Portuguese Egg Tart |
A very pleasant rest.
The main attraction for many visitors to Macau are the casinos so we walked down to the area with the fancy hotels and casinos. We did a walk through of the Grand Lisboa Macau casino to observe the action and find a restroom).
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| Grand Lisboa |
The casino is quite a busy place. Mandatory scanner check, fortunately they missed my pocket knife. Was not so lucky at the Delhi Airport and Calgary Stampede last year. Lost the one in Delhi and had to pay the Stampede to mail me the other one back... too stupid to own a knife. I have no interest in casino gambling, but it is interesting to observe others doing it.
We stayed long enough to to get a feel for the excitement gambling seems to invoke. One guy, apparently on a lucky streak, had quite a crowd around oohing and awing. Gambling is fascinating, not really about necessarily winning, just the excitement of being in the game.
From the casino we continued our largely aimless wandering around the area. Looking for a bank machine with small bills(did not locate), a pork bun,
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| Pork bun |
jerky and a souvenir fridge magnet(successful with all). I got 2 packages of jerky, beef and pork. I thought would be the size of the square they were cutting samples from,? Nope, sold by the 1/2 kilo, got that much of each. A lot but expect can enjoy it before our return. With retail therapy done we were exhausted and found a taxi back to the bus depot for our return trip. There was much more traffic so it took awhile. Another $100hkd.
Now ranked 12th as mainland China ports have surpassed it.
Day 5 Causeway Bay May 17
The place was very busy, frighteningly slippery floor and had to climb a set of stairs to get up to it. Out of the rain, a couple of the patrons were resting on a bench.
Marginal food at best, more expensive than Coral. We had an egg bun, pancakes, hash browns and orange juice. The OJ was the highlight. Wasted a breakfast.
We then went and did a bit of shopping, in area, I got a new shirt at Uniqlo as the other one is getting a bit dirty, will get laundered later. Wanted to purchase a Bluetooth mouse, went to Samsung store, no staff only cases, I let it go. We were going to visit Victoria Park across from the hotel but rain continued in the afternoon.
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| Victoria Park |
There was a large group of folks with tents in the park singing and marching. Virginia said that Indonesians do this every weekend.
We met Eric and Virginia at our hotel in the evening and went by cab to Zhejiang Heen, a fabulous Shanghai style restaurant. A Michelin star rated establishment for 14 years running. Virginia has been a member there since 2011 and was well known to the staff. We were treated to several excellent dishes and a fine red wine Eric brought.
A grand evening out with fine company. Eric and Virginia were very helpful in planning the days out and accompanied us several times. Better friends do not exist. We walked the 15 minutes to the hotel and said our goodbyes for now.
Day 6 - Onto Beijing May 18
Up at 4am bags packed and out the door, tab settled by 5:45. Walked a block to the bus stop and were on the A11 to airport by 6. An hour ride to airport, check-in was quick and efficient.
It was amazing how in a few minutes our identities were reduced to customs agent QR codes...
We had breakfast after security at Jardin de Jade. The cappuccino's were rubbish but the food was decent. Boarded flight by 10 with a bus ride from terminal; the plane was off the ground by 10:30.
A decent flight on a packed 737 max, we arrived at Beijing just before 2pm. No issues entering China, Alice from the tour agency was waiting for us at the exit with a sign bearing our names. A 30+ minute drive and we were at the Howard Johnson Paragon in Downtown Beijing. The next chapter is about to begin.
Once in room and unpacking, I noticed that I had inadvertently forgotten about the beef jerky that I had purchased at Macau, oh well must dispose of it over next few days to be onside with customs...
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