Hong Kong

10/29/02 - Hong Kong  We arrived at about 9pm and took a one hour local bus to Causeway Bay on Hong Kong Island.  The Wang Fat Hostel is near the waterfront in a fantastic and vibrant part of town.  The hostel is really a network of family owned guesthouses in two adjoined 14 storey buildings.  These guesthouses are small apartments with 3 or 4 bedrooms, a common bath and an entry area with a fridge.  Our room was tiny, maybe 8' x 6'.  The bed barely fit along the 6 foot wall - sadly, I'm 6' 1" (my Indian name is Sleeps-With-Bended-Knee).  Before we turned in, we went across to the street to the bustling 24 hour grocery store for a nosh.

10/30/02 - Hong Kong  Rain.  Leanne ran some errands and I stayed in the room and Internetted.  At noon we changed to a larger room and gave our laundry to the reception guy (5 bucks - fluffed, folded and delivered that night).  Leanne headed out again and I worked on the trip web site and other geeky affairs.  At about 4pm I braved the rain and did a little walking around.  We met at the room at 6pm and headed out for dinner at 7:30pm.  Al's Diner is in the small funky SoHo area of Hong Kong island.  It was very small and looked more like a bar than a diner.  The food was authentically American.  At 9pm we met Julian, a SERVAS member interested in meeting foreigners.  We chatted for about an hour at a Starbucks-like coffee shop and we ended our evening riding the preposterously long (1/2 mile) chain of covered escalators installed to keep the throngs out of the streets as they transit to and from work.  My bed was still too short, I foot dangled and head banged my way through the night.

10/31/02 - Hong Kong  We lounged around in the morning and made a couple hours of phone calls with our new call back service.  We then went for a run along the harbor.  At about 1pm we took the subway to Kowloon.  We split up and independently looked at the shops.  Leanne also checked out Kowloon Park where she saw flamingos, peacocks and other wacky birds.  I met Leanne at the incredibly swank Peninsula hotel at 6pm.  She was enjoying afternoon tea and I helped her with her crumpets.  Afterwards we walked around some more and she showed me her bird friends at the park.  She led us to the Temple Street night market, a crowded street teeming with small tented shops of all kinds.  We bought a batch of pirated DVDs and looked at all sorts of clothes and tourist items.  We then headed back to the top of the Peninsula Hotel for a look at the Hong Kong skyline.  We got a second and better look on the Star Ferry as we headed back to Hong Kong Island.  From the terminal we took a street trolley back to our little room.

11/1/02 - Hong Kong  We left at about 10am for the ferry terminal and were nearly there when Leanne realized that we had forgotten our passports, required for visiting Macau.  Macau is a former Portuguese colony 65km west of Hong Kong.  Like Hong Kong, it is a "Special Administrative Region" of China.  Although part of China, Hong Kong and Macau both have border control, so we were going nowhere without our passports.  We bought  tickets for a ferry tomorrow and headed off to the peak tramway.  The tram ascends about 1,000 feet to a peak above Hong Kong island.  We took some nice photos of the city and set off for a long walk along the paths at the top.  At one point I noticed a 6 foot snake about 18" from Leanne, who was four feet ahead of me.  It shocked me and I yelled for her to move.  I considered trying to catch it for dinner, but instead backed off and stopped an approaching hiker.  He was unalarmed and said that he has seen them before. "Are they poisonous?" I asked.  "Yeah, I think so" and off he went.  Ok, so we'll walk down the middle of the path.  After riding the tram down we went home and watched 1/2 of a DVD on the computer.  Next was a nice dinner at a local restaurant.  We sat at a very long lighted table that sat about 8 couples.  It was as modern and clean as the rest of the city.  After dinner we caught a subway under the harbor and went to the top of the Sheraton to gawk at the view.  The only available table was nowhere near the large windows so we struggled to find the pedestrian promenade along the water.  We found it and enjoyed a pleasant walk while viewing the numerous lighted skyscrapers across the harbor.  We found that the ferry was closed when we finally got to it, about midnight, so we took a subway back home, finished our DVD and went to bed.

11/2/02 - Macau  With passports in hand we caught a 10:30 high speed ferry to Macau.  An hour later we were aimlessly walking towards town.  Our first impression was underwhelming.  We walked to one of the many casinos, and as we were told to expect, were refused at the door due to our short pants.  No worry, traveling with Leanne is gambling enough (appendix, lost luggage, eaten by a bus and almost a new snake anklet).  It was interesting to see the occasional Portuguese colonial buildings and Saint Dominic Market was bustling with activity.  We finally we found the impressive ruins of the Church of St. Paul.  Next was lunch in a nice outdoor square where Leanne got the giant prawn she pined for.  I had something benign.  On the way back we walked past a large reservoir and fooled around in an adjacent kids park where I amused Leanne with my ineptitude on the tiny spring mounted ride.  After the ferry ride back Leanne went to read in the room and I roamed around our lively neighborhood one last time.  We fell asleep watching Letterman and 60 minutes.

11/3/02 - Hong Kong  We packed up and caught the one hour bus to the airport at about 11:30pm.  The Cathay Pacific lounge at the shiny new airport was first class.  Our flight to Bangkok, en route to Cambodia, was at 2:30pm.

Hong Kong Summary  Hong Kong is a huge bustling metropolis, very clean and efficient.  We stayed longer than was necessary, but enjoyed the modernity and civility.  I enjoyed catching up on Internet and phone calls.  The weather was in the 60s and 70s with occasional rain.  Currency: $1 = $7.8 HKD.