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Wednesday 5th to Saturday 8th November
KATIE
Well, eventually got round to writing the blog from Hong Kong! Arrived here on Wednesday and it was fantastic to be back in Asia - love the place! We've done most of the usual sightseeing things, and apart from jet lag, James doing something to his neck and me having some sort of bug we're doing well!!!
Didn't have much time to do anything on Wednesday, had a nice drink in the club lounge (splurged out on a club room which includes drinks and snacks from 5.30 to 7.30pm), had the Asian equivalent of fast food and went to bed at 8.30 as we were absolutely shattered having not slept on the plane over.
Thursday - Up early in the morning (6.45) and walked down to Tsim Sha Tsui to the Avenue of stars and to gaze at the huge skyscrapers across on Hong Kong Island. After a couple of false starts (one for me to go back to the hotel and another to change a malfunctioning memory card) we got on the Star Ferry to Central and then onto the Peak Tram where we headed up to Victoria Peak. Amazing views but unfortunately it was pretty cloudy and hazy so couldn't see as much as on a clearer day and the photos don't really pick up any of the detail but it was very cool. Cloud seems to be a constant theme of our travels! Wandered around Central and Statue Square etc for a while then caught the metro back to the hotel. Quick shower and then a small drink in the lounge. Now, when I say small, I don't mean that literally. I asked for a Whisky but I don't think the girl had ever drunk it before. She said she hadn't got any whisky glasses left so had to use a wine glass - which was fine - but then she had filled it right up. You can see the photo when we load it on! Unfortunately as we needed to get out to the harbour for the Sound and light show at 8pm, and I didn't think downing the equivalent of about 5 measures of spirit was a good idea, I had to leave a lot of it - sacrilege. I did suggest to James taking it back to the room and keeping it but we didn't! Sound and light show was quite cool but not the most impressive display ever, still you have to see it! Decided we didn't actually fancy any dinner having had some nibbles in the bar and really feeling tired from the jet lag (and I wasn't feeling that great) so saved money and went for an early night!
Friday - up early again about 6.45 (I managed to wake up at 5.45 and couldn't sleep again which was annoying!). Today's plan was to go to Lantau Island and see the Big Buddha and then look around the sleepy fishing village of Tai O. The Ngong Ping 360 Sky Cable Car is about 6km long and was brilliant! Great views and a really cool way to travel! Ngong Ping village was really sweet and good for looking round lots of shops selling absolute tat (needless to say we didn't buy anything in case you worry about what weird Xmas presents you might get). Big Buddha was amazing, definitely a sight worth seeing and only constructed in the late 90's which surprised me. Looked at taking a hiking route down to Tai O but would have taken 4.5 hours so we reconsidered and took the cable car down again and picked up a local bus there instead. Fun, but the driving is interesting - very slow uphill but like lightening downhill round hair pin bends - it was no wonder I wasn't feeling great by the time the 45 min journey ended, bug or no bug! Wandered round for a while through the markets and looked at the houses on stilts - very reminiscent of Laos and Cambodia - then braved the bus again back to the ferry terminal at Mai Wo. It was all or nothing for local transportation so we got on the ferry back to Central on Hong Kong Island and then took the Star Ferry back to Kowloon hoping to get some good photos of the sky scrapers. Both struggled today with the humidity, really takes it out of you, so after showering and changing we went to Central to find something nice to eat but very soon decided that neither of us fancied anything at all! So, instead we went to the Four Seasons Hotel and enjoyed a jazz band in their bar!
Saturday - leaving for Australia tonight so updating blog this morning and planning to take a tram ride later and see how the fancy takes us, maybe take in Happy Valley too. Who knows!!!
JAMES
Have had a brilliant time in Hong Kong, just wish we had had a few more days really, there is so much to do. I, and probably most other people, probably just think about Hong Kong as one great big city and nothing else. The city itself is amazing - the area of Kowloon which we are staying in (Mong Kok) is apparently the most densely populated place in the world, and you can well believe it. Any high rise of about 25 floors or less just doesn't look big - there are so many that are easily 40 or more floors! I would love to live in one of those - imagine waking up to a view of Victoria Harbour every day. The place is so busy, so many people on the pavements. I have heard of road rage, air rage, and even trolley rage, but here I have been restraining myself from getting pedestrian rage! It seems to be the local way to walk a) very slowly and b) in a random zigzag fashion whilst either talking on the phone, texting, or in one case just being plain sh!tfaced!! The pavements themselves are not particularly wide, so when you try to cram about a million people onto them, frustrations mount!
Other than that, I am amazed at the organisation of the place. Everything is on a huge scale, but everything seems to run so efficiently, there is a tube every couple of minutes, the trains, boats and even the buses run bang on time, and the place is pretty clean considering. I think the GBP400 fine for smoking out of place, and the GBP150 fine for even drinking on a train helps!
As Katie said, we finally managed to get up Victoria Peak on Thursday at the third time of asking, but it was certainly worth it. Even with the haze and smog clouding the view, it was pretty stunning. The skyline of Central is one to rival Manhattan. Just a shame that the photos don't really do it justice! In the evening we wandered down to Tsim Sha Tsui, near the Star Ferry terminal, and watched the Sound and Light show - pretty cheesy, and the show wasn't anything in itself, but the setting was just amazing.
Yesterday was a really cool day. Lantau Island is so different from the Mainland and Hong Kong Island - once outside of Tung Chung there were no high rises, lush green mountainous countryside. Really enjoyed the 25 minute cable car ride up to Ngong Ping to see the Big Buddha, although I can't believe how strenuous the climb was up to the top. It was only about 150 steps! 3 weeks ago we were bounding up to 4600m in Peru (ok, maybe not bounding, but you know what I mean), and this felt harder! Must have been the heat! We have been a pair of lightweights really here, struggling a bit with the humidity and jetlag, and losing our appetites - unheard of for me, although I have managed to destroy the breakfast buffet 3 days running! That is one of the things I like most about staying in good hotels in Asia - they do fantastic buffet breakfasts, which definitely appeals to my gluttonous side!!
After the Big Buddha we took a bus down to the fishing village of Tai O, a world away from Kowloon and Central. Being on the South Western side of Lantau Island, you can see nothing of the high rise metropolis, but yet enjoy an unspoiled view across to the green uninhabited islands of the South China Sea. We wandered into the town, through the fish market, with all sorts of dried oddities, and down some little lanes running behind the stilted houses. You could imagine this is how it was before the country got developed. Once you get over the noise of a plane taking off every 2 minutes from the airport on the other side of the mountain!
We've definitely enjoyed the Club room at the hotel, with free drinks and snacks for a couple of hours every evening, and the free internet access we are now using, although uploading photos is painfully slow (about 1 minute for each shot!) so the remainder will have to wait until Oz. Got a few hours to kill now before heading to the airport so going to head over to Central, take a ride on the trams, and see what else we can find to do!
I will be very sad to leave here tonight, but Australia beckons! By the time we land in Sydney tomorrow morning we will have, in the past 6 days, taken 3 overnight intercontinental flights and traversed 16 time zones!! Will be truly knackered by then...
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