Weekend in Hong Kong

Last month we spent a long weekend in Hong Kong (HK). We took the MTR (rapid transit) Airport Express from the airport to a station near our hotel and then got on the free shuttle to finish the trip to our hotel.  When heading back to the airport, we arranged for a car because the MTR doesn't run that early. Our hotel was in the Admiralty section.

The weather was nice, though it was hot. Almost across the street from the hotel was a beautiful green area—Hong Kong Park. I would love to have a park like this near where we live now. We ended up walking in the park several times.

There were a lot of turtles in the various water features.

Our first stroll through the park was on the way to the Peak Tram boarding area. At the Peak station we had a long queue to purchase our tickets.

After getting the tickets, we had another long queue to wait in to actually board the tram. The place was packed. It's less crowded on weekdays they told us, but we were there on a weekend. The tram cuts a narrow path up the hill between some buildings. You ride up the hill facing forward and that's OK. The tram simply reverses to return to the lower station so you ride backwards riding back down the hill. Literature says the Peak Tram is one of the world's oldest and most famous funicular railways and rises to about 1300 feet. The gradient is between 4 and 27 degrees. It first opened in 1888 and made it easier for the residents of the Peak area.

At the top is an architecturally interesting "tower" topped by a terrace. From the terrace you can see in all directions. Nice views. Inside the tower are tons of restaurants and shops for visitors. I found this photo on the Internet of the "tower"; the view photos are ours.

Nice looking houses!

 And a panoramic shot of one side:

If we visit again we will take in the nature walks said to be accessible from the Peak. Perhaps best done in slightly cooler weather.

Another mode of transport we used was a ferry to Kowloon Island, HK. The ferry provides great views of the harbor and skyline. The hotel concierge gave us a pre-printed card with some of the top sites in town listed in both English and Chinese. This made it pretty easy to handle the taxis if they didn't speak English. Nice!

It was a short taxi ride to the Star Ferry dock. The ferry fare is 2.80 HK dollars on weekends. It's cheaper weekdays we learned. After figuring out how to work the machine to get our tokens, we were immediately able to board a ferry. Our goal on Kowloon was a place known as the "Ladies Market." This is sort of permanent flea market with knock-off purses, watches, cheap women's clothing, cheap knick knacks, etc. I found Kowloon to be a very confusing place—very few signs of any type in English. My Chinese is non-existent. We managed to get some iced tea and some lunch in Kowloon and had a nice chat with a young woman about Indonesia. On our return ferry trip we had no wait either. We got our tokens and immediately boarded for the quick trip back.

The photo below is the ferry we took back to to the other side.

The history of Hong Kong is very complicated. We wanted to  visit the Heritage Museum to gain some understanding but we couldn't find it on foot. We did find the Space Museum but it was closed for renovations except for the Imax theater. So we had a couple of disappointments there. We had no trouble finding alternative things to do as we had a long list of possibles.

Another trip was to the "Western Market." I'd learned from a friend who just moved here from HK that on the upper floor of the "Western Market" there were some small fabric shops. At these shops you could get a piece of fabric cut, pay for it and take it with you. Apparently at many fabric shops in HK you select, pay and have the fabric delivered to you. The fabric isn't on site necessarily. (Photo from the Internet.)

This building is the oldest market building in HK and was at one time a meat and vegetable market. We did get some fabric including some wild and crazy fabric to create a new pair of sleep shorts for B. Suitcase space was extremely limited as we brought only a carry-on bag each.

My friend also let me know about a fabulous grocery store which happened to be located in the mall accessible from our hotel. We would not have discovered it without prior information due to the location and minimal signage. We spent a long time wondering the aisles —the familiar and the new—wishing we could bring items back with us. We did purchase dinner there one night and it was really tasty. The grocery was something like a combination of Whole Foods and Trader Joe's but on a huge scale. Much of the mall was just very high-end shops but there was an educational "toy store" where we discovered jigsaw puzzles for sale. We only purchased one due to the suitcase limitations. Wish it could have been more. They had quite a few choices.

It turns out my newly found jigsaw puzzle buddy is repatriating to the US so we won't be able to continue the puzzle exchange we'd started. Boo hoo.