Friday 13th September - Unlucky for some... But not unlucky for us!

Today we set off on our big adventure around the world. First stop, Hong Kong. Just the matter of a 12 hour flight to contend with first. And saying goodbye to our parents. Weather forecast: Julie Peech had warned us of possible floods (of tears) at Heathrow! For once, the weather man was right.

The journey was fairly uneventful, besides the self confessed multimillionaire who got us drunk in the departures lounge! Start as you mean to go on....

Saturday 14th September

We arrived in Hong Kong at 3pm and made our way to Hong Kong Island via the Airport Express to meet Alexandra (For those who don't know, Alexandra is Cesca's sister). The kind person who will be putting us up and 'putting up' with us for the whole week! After a quick change, Alexandra showed us around some Hong Kong hotspots. Hong Kong is pretty much built on a mountainside, so walking around is quite hard going! Lucky for the Hong Kongees and us, they have installed escalators throughout the city. Quite a weird sight, but one which we could get used to. We stopped off for a drink in a bar at the top of one of the escalators. A good spot for people watching apparently! We then went for dinner in a lovely Thai restaurant. Followed by hitting the sack hard. We were pooped.

Sunday 15th September

We woke up in Alexandra's flat on the 22nd floor. Wow, the views are incredible. Overlooking hundreds of high rise buidings with the harbour in the distance. Today we were hiking a ridge of a 'mountain' called the Dragon's Back, which goes from the east of Hong Kong to a village called Tai Long Wan with a lovely beach. It's a 5 mile walk, which feels a lot further when the sun is beating down on you. The sea was a welcome sight! But after sprinting into it, we soon realised it wasn't going to cool us down much. We managed a short swim to a floating jetty, but were so petrified of sharks we didn't stay in for long! Ash says it was squeaky bum time!

We left the beach after a few hours of chilling, just as the weather began to look a bit hairy. We caught the bus back to Alexandra's where we had a quiet night in. Still trying to overcome the jetlag!

Monday 16th September

Today we were left to our own devices as Alexandra had gone to work. She left us with a guide book of Hong Kong (luckily) and we set off to 'climb' The Peak (which is a very large hill/mountain at the back of her flat). Fortunately for us, similar to the escalator, the Hong Kongees have built a funicular railway to the top! Again we encountered so called squeaky bum time - the train was practically verticle for the majority of the ride. There were times we thought it would never make it up. The views were incredible, the toilets not so much. Cesca refused to go in them as they were not toilets as we know them...more like a hole in the ground with two foot holes. No thanks. We made our way back down by foot.

In the afternoon, we caught the Star Ferry over to the mainland to an area called Kowloon. We had been told about the famous Bird and Flower Market and were keen to see them. After a gruelling 2 hour walk in flip flops and high humidity, through some 'colourful' neighbourhoods, we finally made it unscathed. The flower market was nice, but the bird market was something else. There were thousands of different species of bird crammed into tiny little cages, some we had never even seen before. Including a caged Toucan! An American girl we met summed it up.. 'Its amazing to see but I can't help thinking it's a bit cruel'.

Alexandra was taking us out for our first Dim Sum dinner experience in the evening, so we walked to meet her. En route, we came across the 'Goldfish Market'. This was an even weirder experience than the bird market! Think of a market stall which sells iPhone cases, hundreds hung up on the wall in rows...now replace those iPhone cases with little plastic bags filled with water and different varieties of fish. Topped off by thousands of tiny terrapins thrown in a box at the front of the shop. Further down the road, we came accross shops selling cats and dogs, in 'posh' shops with marble flooring and glass cages. We wondered whether the animals had been drugged as they weren't moving about much. Pretty sad. 'How much is that doggy in the window?' Well...roughly about 400 HKD!

After meeting Alexandra, she took us to one of the most renowned Dim Sum restaurants in Hong Kong, to taste some of the local delicacies. The Dim Sum and dumplings were nice, but the boiled chickens feet were something else...especially when they are served cold. Not as bad as originally thought, but we won't be having them again in a hurry!

Before getting the ferry back to Hong Kong Island and to our long awaited bed, we went to the Avenue of Stars to watch the famous Light Show. You stand overlooking Hong Kong Island and watch the many buildings flash their colourful lights in time to cheesy music. Quite spectacular!

Tuesday 17th September

The majority of today was spent at Hong Kong's Ocean Park, which is a theme park situated on the side of a mountain overlooking the sea and surrounding islands. One of the most scenic theme parks we've ever been to! Beats Alton Towers anyday. The park has a mixture of exotic animals and 'skull shaking' rollercoasters (the Hair Raiser!).Not much else can be said about the day...apart from the weather was great,the views were incredible, and the thousands of chinese visitors were incredibly annoying!

Wednesday 18th September

We had been recommended to go to one of the outlying islands of Hong Kong called Cheung Chau, so this is what we did today. We caught the ferry over (which only cost us about £2) and arrived there about lunch time. We decided we wanted to sample some of the local seafood delights so went for lunch in a seafood restaurant. We had some fresh garlic prawns (as the lobster was way too expensive!) and some shrimp and vegetable rice. It was yummy. We headed off after lunch in search of one of the famous beaches on the island, but an hour in, started to realise we may have taken a wrong turn! However, we stuck with it and saw some amazing sights. We saw a pirates cave, a 'reclining' rock (a boulder hanging off the edge of a cliff!), a deserted beach (with no shark nets - so no swim!) and a massive graveyard overlooking the sea, which was really eerie. Every single gravestone had the face of the person who was buried there! After you notice this, it almost feels like every single face on each gravestone is staring at you. We made our way through to the other side and continued our walk. We came accross a few temples and a few native Cheung Chauees (We're sure that's PC!). We eventually found an amazing little secluded beach (with shark nets!), so we had our long awaited swim...only two hours later than intended. Well worth the wait. We dried off and headed back to catch one of the last ferries home.

Once back on HK island, we met Alexandra and headed up 'The Peak' again, but this time at night. We couldn't believe how different the city looked from up there at night time. It was incredible. One of the best views we have ever seen. We walked all the way down again, taking care not to bump into any giant spiders on the way! Another nights sleep well deserved.

Thursday 19th September

We had a fairly quiet day today. Cesca had to go over to Kowloon to buy some prescription glasses and we had a McDonalds too, a little treat!

In the afternoon, we got the ferry over to an island called Lantau, where we were meeting Alexandra and some of her friends for a night on the beach! We arrived on the bus and got down to the beach, just as the resident island cows descended on to the beach also. Made for nice photos, but it didn't smell very nice! The beach was beautiful and the weather was gorgeous. We checked in to our 'rooms' which were located just above the watersports 'shack'. They were very basic, but functional! Our bedroom looked right over the beach, which was such a treat.

Alexandra and her friends arrived once it had got dark and we went straight for dinner. We had a lovely Thai meal, with lots of red wine. Red wine that came free with the box of beers Ash had bought! It didn't bode well for the rest of the evening..!

After dinner, we sat around a BBQ on the beach and cooked marshmallows, yum yum, and carried on drinking. We had an evening swim in the sea and played some games! Like girls on boys shoulders, then who could knock who over first.

By the time it came to midnight (the start of Cesca's birthday), Cesca was facedown in the sand more or less passed out, and Ash was getting louder and louder having salvaged a bottle of Bacardi from the restaurant! It was never going to end well. We had one more midnight birthday swim, then headed to back to bed (this is after Ash had 'naked danced' for Alexandra and her friend)! All in all a lovely day.

Friday 20th September

Cesca's birthday! And a beautiful day for it. Up early and went for brekkie. Then Ash went back to bed (feeling very fragile from the night before!) and the rest of us went kayaking. It was lovely out on the water, and we didn't see any sharks thank goodness! The rest of the morning was spent chilling on the beach and swimming in the sea. It was unbelieveably hot so spent as much time in the shade as possible!

After a hard time getting back to Hong Kong Island (all the buses were full and there were no free taxis - due to the weather), we changed and headed straight out. We went to the ICC Tower and went to the Ritz-Carlton! Their bar (the Ozone Bar) is based on the 118th floor which was absolutely amazing. Ash (as he was still recovering from the previous night) got a fanta, which cost approxiamtely £7!!

We then met up with one of Alexandra's friend's and also Hannah, who is Cesca's cousin, and had a lovely dinner. We went for a drink after this onto the main 'strip' in Hong Kong, which was an eye opener! Not only were there cockroaches EVERYWHERE, there were some very strange Hong Kongees hanging around as well!

Home to bed after a very different and very fun birthday.

Saturday 21st September

This was our last day in Hong Kong before we jetted off to New Zealand. We didn't have a lot of time, so we caught the bus to a place called Stanley on the other side of the Island, and went for a little shop and lunch. But again, it was so unbearably hot we couldn't do a lot. We caught the bus back, packed up, then made our way to the Airport.

Goodbye Hong Kong, you have been amazing! Not what we expected - a brilliant experience. So much to see and do, and also really vibrant and exciting. We'll be back!

Next stop...New Zealand!

To be continued...