Hong Kong, China
Friday, March 28th, 2008
Hong Kong is about the coolest city on Earth. From the public subway system to the shops and local attractions, everything is nice and state-of-the-art. One of my co-workers (“hi” Donna) has talked many times before about Hong Kong and I never understood the appeal until after having experienced it. And any city that names one of its main thoroughfares “Nathan Road” can’t be all that bad…
Of all the places we’ve visited in the past 3 months, Hong Kong was the first stop where we seriously considered postponing our outbound flight because there is so much to do and see. In the end, we decided to fly on to Beijing, but this is one city we are returning to.
On our first full day we toured around Hong Kong Island, popping in and out of shops and ate lunch in the SoHo district. I was still recovering from some bad food we’d had the day before so we decided to call the day short and head back to our room.
On day two, we took the train to Hong Kong Disneyland and spent most of the day touring the park. It’s a lot like Disneyland in California except about 1/5 th the size. The other big difference is the snacking options. Instead of the customary hot dogs and nachos, it’s fried squid and fish balls on a stick. Shelly tried out some of the regional cuisine as my stomach still wasn’t right. As far as rides went, our all-time favorite, Space Mountain, was here and we rode it twice.
After Disneyland we took the train south and caught the Ngong Ping 360 gondola to the Big Buddha. This gondola starts near the Hong Kong airport and takes the rider through some nearby hills to the largest bronze sitting buddha in the world. It was late afternoon when we took the ride so the sunset made for some amazing photos.
On our third and final day, no stop in Hong Kong would have been complete without a pilgrimage to Macau. Another co-worker (“hi” Carl) is always raving about his Macau Wynn experience, so Shelly and I had to see it for ourselves. Armed with every lucky charm we brought or acquired on the trip and some spending cash, we tried our luck at blackjack. The night started great and we doubled our money. However, all good things must come to an end and the odds finally caught up to us. When we lost all of our “seed money” and went to the ATM to reload, none of our bankcards worked. There was something wrong with the banking connection that night and in hindsight, it was probably the best thing that could have happened. I guess Macau will keep our Hong Kong dollars safe until the next time we return.
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