Vinnie and Pat's Chinese Adventure 2009

Day fifteen – The journey home

2009-09-16T23:00:00.003+08:00

Getting up at 7am, we checked out and took a taxi to the Kowloon Airport Express Station. The Airport is only 24mins away by train, costing less then €9. You can even use your octopus card to make the trip. Very handy for us we had some credit left on our cards that needed to be used.

We were actually able to check into our flight at the train station, which itself is situated inside the Elements Shopping mall, the same place we took the bus to Shenzhen Airport. It’s great to know we don’t need to drag our bags onto the train. The next time we’ll see them should be in Dublin!

We we couldn’t get two seats together; we were offered one upgrade for the 13 hour flight home. We declined, as we really wanted to sit close to each other. Thankfully at the airport they were able to allocate use emergency exit seating with at least two free rows in front of us. Perfect to stretch out and rest on the way home.
As the flight had been delayed, we were given breakfast vouchers to pick up some food at the airport. We opted for the Burger King croissant and pancakes. Not very tasty, but filled us up.

It’s great, Hong Kong Airport has free WIFI throughout! It’s allowed us to catch up with twitter in-between trying to spend the last of our cash.
The service on the flight was the reverse of the coming over. We started with breakfast, both Vinnie and I had the Chinese option, noodles with Dim Sum, might have well have our last Chinese meal of the trip!

Arriving into Heathrow at 5:30pm local time, we connected to our AerLingus flight at 8:10pm and arrived into Dublin around 9:30pm.

Packing to leave :(

2009-09-16T03:51:00.001+08:00

It's after 3am and we're packing to leave. It's been one amazing adventure. We've got many more updates to follow, going to use the 13 hour flight to London to get blogging, so watch out for those. Our flight was scheduled for 7:20am but due to the recent typhoon, it's been pushed back to 11:20am. This means we arrive into Dublin around 9pm local time, some 18 or so hours after taking off! We'll update via twitter/twitvid before then!

Day fourteen – The affects from Koppu

2009-09-15T23:00:00.005+08:00

What a night, the apartment shuck, but at 10am the warning signal was dropped back to a T3 and was downgraded to a tropical storm. The Typhoon had a named too – Koppu! Sweet!

It’s our last full day in the city, so trying to take things easy we opted to take the midlevel escalators over on Hong Kong Island. Rather then having to walk up the hills around the small streets, you can take it easy and ride the mid level escalators that will take you the easy way up through the streets. Getting towards the top, we took a bus back down to the ferry port and traveled via Star Ferry to Hung Hom were we visited The whompai mall. Taking the MTR subway, we headed north to the New City Plaza mall with its 300+ stores.

We got back to the apartment around 6pm after making a stop a Beard Papas. I adore those cream puffs. In the London store there are only two varieties, but here we managed get 7 totally different kinds from white peach to fresh mango. Heaven. We settle into a Golden Girls Marathon (we brought season 1 with us) before packing out suitcases. We popped out for a quick drink before bed.

Thankfully we’d checked our email. Our 7:20am flight to London had been delayed at first by 3 hours then 4. This affects our connecting flight to London. Thankfully as we’ve a through ticket, Quantas would take responsibility for booking our connecting flight. So the plan is to leave the apartment around 8am for our 11:20am flight to London. Arrive into London around 5:30pm to connect with our 8pm flight to Dublin. If we miss the 8pm flight there is only one last flight home, if we miss that, we could be stranded in London overnight!

Day thirteen – Wash out at Disneyland

2009-09-14T23:00:00.023+08:00

We set aside today to visit Disneyland. It’s a rather new park in Hong Kong opening some 4 years ago. Currently it’s the smallest Disneyland in the world, with Paris being the biggest outside of the original in California. This will be Vinnie’s first time to visit a Disneyland, last year we opted to visit DisneySea in Tokyo instead of Disneyland.

The MTR Subway easily connects you to the Disneyland line, a specially decorated subway train with Mickey Mouse ears etc. It only cost €1.40 to get our apartment straight into the park taking the MTR.

Beforehand we’re read information relating to weather and visits to Disneyland. The park runs as normal on a T1 signal, but all outdoor rides and attractions shut down during a T3. Unfortunately by the time we arrived, a T3 signal had been hoisted. We still had to pay full price and were warned that a T8 could be raised within the next few hours. A T8 means the Tropical Typhoon is approaching the city and for all services to shut down with everyone staying at home in-doors.

It rained almost non-stop. None of the outdoor rides were open. Most of the restaurants were closed. It really was a depressing atmosphere at the magic kingdom, not ideal for Vinnie’s’ first visit.

We did manage to ride the Winnie the Pooh and the It’s a Small World rides. The only indoor rollercoaster, Space Mountain was closed for refitting for the upcoming Halloween season.

After almost 2 hours in the park, we were told the T8 had been raised and the park was slowly shutting down. The staff jumped into action tying everything down with string in anticipation for the impending storm. We were ushered out of the park. It cost us €70/HK$700/$90 for less then two hours and two kids rides. Not even a main street parade or firework. Not fun at all. We did manage to get a few pics with the characters. Upon leaving the park we were told our tickets where valid for reentry up to 6 months from now. Fine if we lived close by. Anyone want free tickets?

We headed back into the city for a stroll along the avenue of the stars, a promenade with stars/handprints of famous Chinese movie personalities. It’s located along Victoria Harbor – perfect with an impending typhoon. It rained and the winds picked up strength. By 6pm, the T8 flag has been hoisted and the city was on shut down.

We headed back to the hotel to follow the news reports. We had no option but to stay in. This city is well prepared for occasions like this. They taped large windows, shut down all stores. Taxi demanded premium too!

It was pretty frightening up on the 20th floor with an exposed west window. The wind howled and fittings outside banged. The rain poured very heavily outside. Thankfully according to the Hong Kong Observatory, the path of the typhoon was take it south of Hong Kong, but wind speeds would still be very strong with inches of rain dumped on the city. A T8 does however bring a party atmosphere for the locals; as for them it means no work or school. They tend to head to the cinema or local bars to otherwise make the most of the enforced time off work!

Tropical Cyclone Bulletin from 1 hour ago!

2009-09-14T19:35:00.005+08:00

So a Tropical Cyclone is hitting the city, the below is the latest warnings we've to follow!!

Bulletin issued at 18:45 HKT 14/Sep/2009

At 7 p.m., Typhoon Koppu was centred about 180 kilometres south-southeast of Hong Kong (near 20.8 degrees north 114.7 degrees east) and is forecast to move northwest or west-northwest at about 16 kilometres per hour towards the coast of western Guangdong. Gale winds are blowing over offshore waters and high ground. Local winds are expected to strengthen further generally.

(Precautionary Announcements with No. 8 Signal)

Complete all precautions in your home. Lock all windows and doors, fit bars into position and insert reinforced shutters and gates if they are available. Adhesive tape fixed to large window-panes in exposed positions will reduce damage by broken glass. Storm water drains should be cleared of leaves and rubbish.
Park your car where it is least likely to be damaged.
Do not stand near windows on the exposed side of your home. Move all furniture and valuables away from these areas. Make sure you have a safe place to shelter, should windows be broken.
Since seas are very rough and the current is strong with changing direction, you are advised to stay away from the shoreline and not to engage in water sports.
Owners of neon signs are reminded that they should now arrange for the electricity supply to their signs to be cut off.
Please listen to radio or watch TV for the latest weather information broadcast at the 15th, 30th, 45th and 58th minute of each hour. You can also browse the Hong Kong Observatory's web site for the information.

Tropical Cyclone Warning!

2009-09-14T13:17:00.003+08:00

During summer, typhoons, or as their known in Hong Kong, tropical cyclones, regularly hit or skirt the city. Yesterday the city raised the city to alert level T1 and overnight it increased to T3. Next is T8 which means the city begins to close down awaiting the impact, fingers crossed we don't reach that. Until then, it's umbrella time as the hot rains hit the City.
The latest warnings are available from http://www.hko.gov.hk/wxinfo/currwx/tc.htm

UPDATE @7PM: Level T8 has been hoisted. The city is shutting down!!!

Day twelve – shopping

2009-09-13T23:00:00.007+08:00

We set aside today to visit some more of the malls in the area. We started off in City Mall, located by the Star Ferry port and conveniently some 10 minutes away from our apartment. After this we headed over to Wan Chai via the Star Ferry.

Another very hot day, we were both soaked with sweat from both the heat and humidity. We wandered around the Wan Chai area before walking to Causeway bay and it’s many shopping plazas.
Times Square is one of the main centres, boasting some 260 stores across some 16 floors! We noticed it had started to rain after we arrived, this was the first time we’d seen rain on the entire holiday. Not bad after 12 days considering it rains everyday back home.

Returning back to the apartment we noticed that Typhoon Signal T1 had been hoisted. We’ve never heard of this before. Apparently this region is prone to typhoons or tropical cyclones from April to September each year. They have a flag system that is displayed at the entrance to all subway stations and on the top right hand corner of all local television channels. The rains continued into the night as the cyclone moved slowly inwards from its current 200km location offshore.

Day Eleven – Ocean Park

2009-09-12T23:00:00.007+08:00

There are a few theme parks located in and around Hong Kong, from Disneyland, a Buddhist “land” to a full-scale replica of Noah’s Ark. Today we visited Ocean Park, located on an island divided into two zones by a large mountain. Passage between both lands is via mountain cable car or underground train. The park claims to be the most visited in the entire region, shadowing Disney with his attendance figures last year. If Pandas, roller coasters combined with ocean attractions such as aquariums and dolphin shows are for you, this is the park to visit.

Local city bus 629 takes you directly to park. Tickets (around €22) can be purchased before boarding the city bus. It takes around 20mins to get there.

Thankfully it was a little overcast today, nevertheless the sun did break through, rising the temperatures back into the 30’s. Whilst I can’t stand heights I can’t resist the urge to try out every roller coaster. The first, a water based one, with a free fall certainly set us up. Vinnie even rode it. It started with a gentle cruise before entering a tunnel that suddenly ended, dropping us some 50 meters or so. We both got drenched.

The second, and by all means the worst roller coaster I’ve ever been on in my life followed. The total length of the track was just shy of 1km, with sudden drops taking me out over the mountainside, with the South China Sea some 200 – 300 meters directly below. It was terrifying.

As the rides and attractions in this zone of the park are located on and around a mountain, there are elevators of 100 – 200 meters taking between the levels. The park is very well organized and in fact not run for profit. There is a moral message behind here with green eco issues being promoted where possible. For example, they operate a no straw day once a week to save on plastic waste.

Other highlights included the giant reef aquarium, which we entered at sea level and slowly walked down two levels underground to see the fish at different levels in their artificial habitat. The Jellyfish Spectacular shed light on the weird and mysterious world they live in.

Taking a 1.5km cable car over the top of the mountain we connected to the second zone that is home two giant pandas. One a shy female who set with her back to the public, the second a male who appeared to love the attention as he set at the front of his enclosure letting everything hang out, chomping his way through a ton of bamboo. It was something else being this close to a panda. They are truly beautiful creatures.

We left the park late and made it home for a quick change and a few drinks over on Hong Kong Island, this time taking in some different bars starting with an Irish one!

Day ten – Back to Hong Kong

2009-09-11T23:00:00.022+08:00

So the 5 days in Beijing are up, today we headed back to Hong Kong. Beijing is one very LARGE city and a city in transition. We certainly grew to like it and will be planning a trip back at some stage in the future to see just how the city develops. Until then we can’t wait to get back to Hong Kong and it’s more compact New York City feel and it’s HEAT!!!

Our flight was actually cancelled, so we’d to wait an additional 90 mins for the next. The 3hour flight back to Shenzhen was followed by the Chinalink coach across the border, back to Hong Kong.
As part of the swine flu precautions, an official came onto the coach and filmed everyone.

Gathering it’s to prove we travelled and where we sat incase anyone later developed the flu. We arrived into the Elements Shopping Centre terminal around 8pm, some 9 hours after checking out of our Beijing Hotel. Picking up quick grocery shopping, we taxied back to the comforts of our apartment.

Granted, a day was semi “wasted” by travelling like this mid way through our holidays, but it was worth it to see the capital of China and The Great Wall itself.

The evening was spent having drinks over on Hong Kong Island and a club.

Back online!

2009-09-11T21:34:00.003+08:00

Now that we are back from Beijing, we can blog again. We had limited internet and when online, sites like blogger (where this is hosted), twitter and facebook were blocked! Lots of updates to follow!

Day nine – The Great Wall

2009-09-10T23:00:00.003+08:00

A work colleague of Vinnie’s has a friend, Fiona, who is based out here in Beijing. Through her, we orgaised a private tour guide and driver to take us to The Great Wall of China and The Summer Palace. After filling ourselves on the breakfast buffet, we were picked up around 8:30am and started the 90km drive to the Mutianyu part of The Great Wall.

There are three main open stretches of the wall accessible from Beijing. The first, Badaling, is over crowded with tourists and market sellers and is in fact the closest being some 70km outside the city. The second is not really walk-able as it’s in ruins. The third, Mutianyu, is the one we visited. It’s a 3km stretch, restored by the Germans in the 80’s on top of the original foundations. You can’t walk outside the 3km boundaries, as it’s too dangerous.

The weather was perfect, around mid 20’s, slightly overcast and very little fog. We walked around 2km up and down steps, some extremely steep. The views were breathtaking.

After The Great Wall we drove for over an hour through the Chinese countryside, back into the suburbs of Beijing to visit the Summer Palace were we took a dragon boat ride on the lake. This Palace was the summer retreat for the Emperor and family.

That evening we met up with Fiona, who worked close to the apple store we’d visited earlier that week. She brought us to a local Thai restaurant owned by an English/Thai couple. The food was amazing; it was the first chicken based meal in China to be made with white meat! We were both so stuffed from the massive portions.

An early night for us tonight as tomorrow we’ve to get up early to pack and travel back to Hong Kong.

Day Eight – Forbidden City and Olympic Village

2009-09-09T23:00:00.014+08:00

The Forbidden City was the enclosed home of the emperor, totally shut off from the common city folk. In fact it was only opened to visitors recently after the communist take over of the country in 1949.

They say to take a half-day to explore the many gardens, throne rooms and out-houses. It is massive but a little repetitive, nevertheless worth the time to explore. Traditional architecture is abundant combined with monuments to the crane and turtle (symbols of strength and longevity). Large iron pots are dotted everywhere, originally filled with water and used as the primary fire-fighting defense. Many of the building have burnt down and have been rebuilt many times since their initial building in the 15th century. All in all, it’s a super large un-spoilt traditional spot and a must see visit.

Leaving via the north gate, we noticed another palace high on a hill in the jingsong gardens, which would provide a perfect view down onto Beijing and the Forbidden City below. In fact the hill is artificial, created from the rubble extracted to create the moat around the Forbidden City. It was well worth the 300 or so steps.

Leaving, we wandered around 90 minutes, heading east in search for the subway. We did find one, line 4, but it’s not open yet. This city is expanding and growing at an alarming rate. New subway lines are opening almost every other month! Imagine progress like that at home – I don’t think so.

Finding the subway, we headed out to the site of the Beijing Summer Olympics of 2008. Rising out of the subway the “birdsnest” and “watercube” where straight in front of us. AMAZING AMAZING!!!

You can actually get tickets to enter the “birdsnest” stadium, well worth it. It must have been something else to have been here last year to watch the games. During they stay, the soundtrack to the opening ceremony was played, almost haunting. The souvenir shop is still open, allowing you to pick up those last remaining 2008 souvenirs. Another must see.

After a very long day of walking, we relaxed in the hotels swimming pool and Jacuzzi.

Day Seven – Temple of the Heavens

2009-09-08T23:00:00.010+08:00

We actually slept in today, leaving the hotel after 2pm! As we’re rather central to most of the historic sights, we walked around the area, leading us to the night markets, which had already begun. There live insects on sticks could be consumed or skewers of small hearts. Totally disgusting!! Naturally the market sellers jump into action the moment they see tourists.

Taking in a local store, we picked up some bottles of Vanilla Coke. Coke is written in Chinese and only costs RMB3 (30cent) a bottle, a far cry from the €1.70 back home. If you buy from the street sellers, this drops to RMB1 (10cent).

We wandered onto a new high street that is being built to replicate an old/traditional street. It’s must be 1km long, but contains modern/western stores like H&M and Zara. Building construction operates 24/7 here, so I’m sure they will have this area finished in time for the Oct 1 public holidays.

Wandering around, we stumbled into a houton market. The houtons are narrow/labyrinth type backstreets, part of original Beijing, which more and more are being torn down to build their new city. The place was such a sensual treat; locals bought and sold all manners of items. Young and old mixed. We stood out naturally being the only two non-locals. A real treat and find.

Our wanderings lead us to the Temple of Heaven and it’s surrounding park. Unfortunately it was too late to gain entry into the actual monument, but we did spend a good 2 hours wandering around the park, which was truly beautifully. The site represents the sun/heavens and earth through circle and square references respectively.

There are three main religious buildings, each of which would have been used as part of a lengthy religious ritual to the gods. As would you expect, traditional Chinese architecture is to be found throughout the park. As it was closed to the public for many years, everything is rather intact.

Leaving the park, we stumbled upon the Pearl Market, a 3 story indoor department like store of copy-everything. They had an entire section for Abercrombie, all fake and overpriced for fakes too. We tried to haggle down to €5 for a tshirt, but walked away when their best offer was €8 from an original €30.

Oh we also found the only Apple Store in China, the open wifi connection allowed us to skype back home :)

That evening we popped out to one of the entertainment district, a whole €1.40 taxi ride (around 15 minutes) were we visited a club.

Day Six – Beijing Calling

2009-09-07T23:00:00.007+08:00

Like it or not, we’d an early start this morning, thankfully we’d stayed in last night. Taking a taxi outside our apartment, some €4 later we arrived at the Chinalink bus terminal in The Elements Shopping centre to take the 7:15am bus to Shenzhen Airport, in mainland China. It’s actually possible to check into your flight at the bus terminal, but for some reason, this was not working for our passports.

The total journey time from Hong Kong to Shenzhen was a little under 90 minutes, taking a newly opened western corridor connecting Hong Kong to the mainland. At the border we had to change bus after clearing immigration. The complete immigration process was very smooth, the hall is quite long, Hong Kong at one end China at the other. Clearing exit checks with Hong Kong, where our visa was revoked, we moved to Chinese health check, were our temperature was taken (in case we’d swine flu) then onto Chinese Visa control. The complete process only took 10 minutes. So fast, so smooth, nothing like the stories we’d read online. Leaving the hall, our connecting bus awaited taking us to the Airport.

You can tell you are on the mainland as soon as you board the connecting bus as it changes from a right hand drive to a left hand!

Arriving at the airport, we checked into our flight and changed €100 worth of Hong Kong Dollars into Chinese Yuen. Unsure of the currency, we didn’t think we’d have enough, but this was soon made clear when we ate breakfast at the KFC. A breakfast for two of us was only RMB20 (around €2).

Shenzhen Airport is local, very local. No one speaks English. Everything is in Chinese, so be prepared to make lots of funny hand signals and get some weird looks from the locals. Even the toilets are local, so holes in the ground!! We boarded another Boeing 747, taking us the 3hours to Beijing.

Arriving around 2pm, we made our way to the city and our hotel, Crowne Plaza. The Airport Express is the best way to get into the city. It only costs RMB25 (€2.50) for a single journey, linking you with the Beijing Subway, where we picked up their equivalent of an Oyster Card (The Beijing Smart Card). This was rather difficult as no-one could speak English and not many use the card. It appears to have been introduced for the Olympics last year, like a lot of the infrastructure in the city, but locals haven’t embraced, preferring to pay for single Journeys. The deposit is RMB20 (€2). We loaded ours with RMB30 (€3) to get it going for at least 1 or 2 journeys. However we learned a single journey to anywhere on the network is only RMB2 (20cent)!!!! Buses costs RMB0.4 (4cent). Transport in this city is VERY VERY cheap and taxis are included. A basic 2km ride is capped at RMB10 (€1), which is payable in either cash or using the Smart Card.

To be truthful, we both felt a little frightened the first day in Beijing. It’s a massive city with a total area coverage equivalent to that of the entire country of Belgium. People are everywhere, contrast is apparent. People reacted as two white hairy legged Irishmen shared their local subway. Some laughed, others starred whilst some just took photos. This was something we weren’t expecting. Given the fact the city hosted the Olympics last year you would think outsiders are common, but this is not the case. You’ve lush rich areas beside backstreet markets. It felt more like eastern Europe then a capital city as we walked from the subway to the hotel, which itself is located in rich shopping area.

Being a platinum member of their loyalty scheme, arriving into the Crowne Plaza we where ushered to the private members check-in on the 8^th floor. We’d been given a business upgrade on the top floor!

It was approaching 5:30, so we didn’t unpacked, just headed straight down the road to the nearby Tien’a min square. We like to walk or take public transport where possible, but a time saving tip is use taxis in this City. They are too cheap to be avoided! 1000’s of locals where gathered in front of the Chairman Mao image. Something was up. The Army were everywhere. They marched past using at alarming speed then started screaming at the crowds. We were then pushed back like a pack of sheep being herded by dogs. It was rather intimidating. I was frightened but wanted to capture as much on tape. As it happened, what we were witnessing was the nightly lowering of the national flag.

This city is on constant alert. Police/Amy and guards are stationed almost everywhere in the communist uniforms’ rather like the Soviet or Germany Army during the world wars. They are turned out to impress and mean business. Entering the underground passageways or subway you’ve to pass Security control where bags are scanned and people are searched. It turns out the city is gearing up for the 60^th Anniversary of the countries communist formation. Preparations are well underway and security is very tight.

Standing amongst the crowd, we really felt like outsiders. The way we dressed, the colour of our skin etc. People again starred, one even asked for photo of her standing beside us!! Beijing is going to different!!!

Arrival into Beijing

2009-09-07T14:15:00.001+08:00

As this is being blogged, we should have touched down into Beijing International Airport. Whilst we have been staying in Hong Kong these past few days, it's considered a separate region with it's own governing model. This morning we passed over the boarder to China int Shenzhen and took off to Beijing on a 3 hour internal flight with Air China. Flying domestic like this saved us over €200 each and we get to do boarder control at Shenzen as opposed to Beijing. At the moment we are en-route to our hotel and will update later tonight with our first impressions of the peoples capital and real China!

Day Five – Kowloon Park and Elements

2009-09-06T23:00:00.006+08:00

Given the fact we didn’t get to bed until 6am, we didn’t get out of the apartment until 4pm today. The main aim today was to find how to get to the Bus Station in the Elements shopping mall. The ChinaLink service provides a direct bus to Hong Kong to Shenzhen Airport in Mainland China. Their terminus is located in this shopping mall. In fact their service is so efficient you can also check into your flight at the mall. Reading some blogs beforehand suggested the service wasn’t running or takes too long. Rather then chance anything; we wanted to get to the mall to find out for ourselves. There are other ways of getting to Shenzhen Airport, but this ChinaLink service appears to be the best. Unfortunately their website is not in English.

The Elements mall is located close to our apartment, so we decided to walk over to it via Kowloon Park. This park is really a community resource. It contains all weather footballs pitches, ponds, an aviary, shops including an icecream only McDonalds to both indoor and outdoor swimming pools! Perfect for weather like today when it’s 34c outside, with a feel like 40c.

The Elements mall is operated by the metro company, so as such contains the main Kowloon subway station and Airport Express. Free shuttle buses link the station to most local hotels, very handy if you are travelling by the Airport Express to Hong Kong International Airport. The mall is divided into 5 areas or elements (water, fire, wood, earth and metal) with each area designed to reflect their own element.

We passed by Austin Road and Station en-route, which gave me some amusement as this is my brothers name. It was warm, too warm, so we were very pleased to be greeted by an Ice Rink as soon as we entered the shopping mall!

The ChinaLink sales office is located on the first floor. The English speaking staff in bright pink uniforms were very friendly and provided us all the information we required. As our flight from Shenzhen was at 11am, we’d need to be on a 7:45am bus at the latest. So an early start for us tomorrow. The total cost for a return journey is only €14, amazing value when you take into account the €200 saving per person on flying from Shenzhen domestically as opposed to International from Hong Kong Airport. I’ll blog separately about our experiences and details on how to use the ChinaLink service to connect to Shenzhen again.

After purchasing our tickets, we headed straight for food. Being brave again, we opted for a rather busy local restaurant were we order Dim Sum, pork and shredded chicken noodles. Chinese food here is NOTHING like at home. There was too much food, we ate what we could and the bill was around €16 including tip for both meals. Amazing value.

Some more wandering around the mall followed before we headed back to the apartment with food supplies before heading up to the Night Temple Market.

Day Four – The Peak

2009-09-05T23:00:00.003+08:00

It’s great having you’re own kitchen with fridge etc . when on holidays. Whilst some, okay, most would argue the opposite, for us it means access to fresh food when you want. We kick started the day (well afternoon as we’re still lazy!) with a fresh fruit salad. A whole watermelon is around €1. Amazing value.

We took the MTR, Hong Kong's Metro from Kowloon Island over to Central on Hong Kong Island, where we connected with The Peak Tram. As we’ve already recommended, if you plan on visiting this city, get yourself an Octopus card. We were able to skip the rather long queue of visitors at the tram station simply by using our prepaid Octopus card. The Peak, some 800 meters above the city provides incredible views of the harbor from above the highest buildings. The entire city sprawls beneath you. The cost of the upward journey was around €3 and €2 to come down. The gradient is very steep, so be prepared to hold on! Great fun!

Leaving the tram station, you enter the first of two peak shopping malls with some nice gifts to be had. We opted to eat in Burger King, how western of us. It was very cheap, fueling us for our hour-long trek around the summit walk, a 3.5 km pathway around the peak itself. The views are breathtaking. At one point, dragonflies danced in the air to the setting sunset above the skyscrapers and fishing boards beneath. Nothing can compare to the views from here. Truly beautiful; hard to find in another city.

The most popular time for The Peak is at sunset. Most couples come up to see the sun set over The South China Sea and witness the nightly light/laser (and sometimes fireworks) show from the skyscrapers beneath. We opted to head down early to squeeze in some more shopping in the central area.

Not only do you have all of the international fashion brands in this city, but you’ve the UK ones too. There is a massive Marks and Spensers, which we had to pop into. We left with some overpriced hot cross buns. Tasty!

Taking the MTR we re-connected with Kowloon Island where we visited the evening gold fish and ladies markets. There are markets for just about everything in this city; you’ll find most in midtown Kowloon around Mong Kok. The almost 500meter stretch or backstreet dedicated to goldfish was a sight. Store after store with fish of all sizes in plastic bags for sales. Some fish were tiny, so had lots of room to swim, whilst others where so large all they could do was look out longingly for someone to free them. Larger stores offered full aquariums and accessories. Nestled towards the end of the market were a few pet stores with one dedicated to bull dogs only!

The goldfish market lead nicely into the ladies market, which unlike the named suggests, is a 1km long narrow street filled with stalls selling clothing for men and women. You can buy copy-anything from D&G to the Gucci. We believe due to crack down in laws, they are rather open about the items being fake.

Heading back to our apartment, we found a Beard Papas in one of the subway stations. As some of you know, I can’t get enough of these delightful cream puffs of happiness. They are a Japanese sweet chain, recently expanded to the UK. We picked up 4 cakes and went back to the apartment get ready for Saturday night out Hong Kong Style; we didn’t get back to bed until 6am! The bars stay open until 3, some later, with the clubs staying open until sunrise!

Day Three - Strolling around Nathan Road, Kowloon

2009-09-04T23:00:00.016+08:00

We got up around 11am but didn't leave the apartment until after 2pm. We're still wrecked from the travel and jet lag. The sun sets here around 6pm, so we've to take advantage of all available light.

We opted to stay local to Kowloon Island, with the aim to walk up to Mong Kok to see the goldfish/bird and ladies markets. That didn't happen. We didn't take into account the massive shopping street called Nathan Road and the heat (33c with a feels like of 38c, thats 100F).

View Day Three Stroll in a larger map. This is a map showing the route we took from bottom to top. The restaurant and symphony of lights viewing point are also shown

The streets around Kowloon are bustling with all sorts of activities. You got major international brands like Body Shop and H& M sitting along side the many 100's of traditional chinese medicine boutiques with their weird and wonderful displays of dried fish and animal parts. The sights, the sounds and smells are are draining to take in when combined with the heat factor.

We navigated our way along Nathan Road, a 2 mile trek, taking a break half way for some lunch. We'd wanted something traditional, I wanted some Dim Sum, the local favourite. We stumbled across a nice clean restaurant called Joys which had an English menu, so we decided that would do us. You've to indicate the quantities of each item using a pencil and grid on the menu. The items varied from Chicken Dim Sum to calves liver with rice.

Naturally Chicken feet were on the menu. We settled for a selection of Dim Sum, one rice filled, two meat followed by some rice rolls (which might have been desert of sorts) and the vile Chicken with lotus leaf rice. The chicken and rice dish, was indeed vile. They must have had the bird in the kitchen and cut it up into random pieces. Our plate contains unidentifiable parts, including bone and skin. For an anatomy students, it perhaps was a good chance to examine cross sections of the chickens body, but for us, it was too much. Vinnie managed to pick some meat from the plate. I couldn't touch any of it. From the looks of it, stay away from chicken here. We did order two very strange drinks, one a milky black jelly the other milky red bean - both topped with ice shavings. The total cost for the meal was HK$107 (around €9.60).

We never made it to the markets, deciding to head back to the clock tower viewing point along the southern tip of the Island to watch the nightly Symphony of Light show, the worlds longest running permanent light and sound show. Every night at 8pm, the buildings along the water front light up in a light and sound show for some 15 minutes. Using coloured lights and lasers, the harbor is transformed. Speakers are positioned around the viewing areas, otherwise the soundtrack is transmitted on the Radio. It was very beautiful. We've lots of great video footage which will be uploaded at some stage.

Afterwards we walked back to the apartment, which is conviently located 10 mins away. We ventured a slightly different route back taking in a shopping street lined with every designer boutique you could imagine, from the Gucci to Prada. We appear to have all the BIG fashion houses on our door step.

After some rest and refreshing we ventured out for some drinks locally. If we head over to Hong Kong Island we've to take a taxi back. Besides there are plently of places to visit on this side of the water. We started of in an empy Irish bar (naturally) located right beside our hotel. This was followed by three local bars. Smoking is banned in all indoor and most public spaces here, but the local bars on this side declare themselves as members only to get around this. Horrid. The bars we'd visited last night over on Hong Kong Island where more western and - well - smoke free.

We retired to bed around 4am after another horrid chicken burger from McDonalds. Stay away from the Chicken over here! It's not Chicken!!!!

Day Two - Arrival into The East

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Our flight into Hong Kong, stops for 90 minutes before continuing onto Melbourne for something like another 8 hours. We were wrecked after only the 11 hours it took to make it this far, one of these days we'll travel onward to Australia, but for this Holiday, it's China.

The Airport is very modern indeed, first store to greet us is a Starbucks! Mental, but I love it! You don't need a visa to visit Hong Kong. EU citizens receive an immediate 90 day boarding visa. We'd to pass through a heath check (for swine flu) which required us to complete a health declaration form. The health officials, dressed in blue with surgical masks didn't take our temperatures, just processed our paper work. Previous to this, we did spot a health screen station, staffed with some 6 officials monitoring heat sensitive cameras positioned throughout the arrivals hall. Hong Kong takes swine flu very seriously. So passing health check, passport control, bag collection and customs, we enter the main airport building to find yet another Starbucks and now a Burger King! Are we in America or China? Either way, it's amazing thus far.

The Octopus card is a must here. It's like the Oyster card in London. You load it with cash and can use it to make countless payments everywhere, from the Airport Express to 7 Elevens. The Airport express connects you to the city in around 25 minutes. It costs around HK$100 (€9). The train is very modern, fitted with LCD TVs and controllable speakers in your head rests! We took the express to Hong Kong and connected with the subway to our apartment on the Kowloon side of the city.

We are staying in a busy shopping district, in a chain apartment-style hotel, The Citedines. They are a French company, with properties world-wide. We've stayed with them many times as they offer a home from home experience including bedroom, living room and kitchen. Perfect for us. We have great view from our 20th floor of Hong Kong Island and Victoria Harbor with it's awesome SkyLine, voted the worlds best.

Once checked in, and cases dumped, we headed straight out to stock up the fridge. The Wellcome supermarket is located around the block from the hotel which stocks everything from local goods (which has bi-lingual labeling) to UK and American.

This city is HOT, it's 29c in the morning and 33c at noon. We are warm, sweaty and HOT!!!!

As we were wrecked we retired to bed for the afternoon. In the evening we explored downtown Kowloon, taking in the Avenue of the Stars and the world famous Star Ferry connecting us with Hong Kong Island (which only takes 5 minutes and costs 20cent!).

It's funny, we talk briefly to a young Irish couple back in London. They too where transfering from terminal 1 to teminal 4. Our paths continued to cross. We met them in duty free, on the plane and now in the airport. And to make it "worse", walking from our apartment this evening we heard a "Hey lads", yes it was them again!

We visited two bars, Volume and Zoo. The owner in Zoo was so funny, we went around giving shots to all the westerners, forcing them all to mix in the process :)

We took a taxi back to the hotel, via an underground tunnel. The ride, some 15/20 minutes only cost €7. Very cheap. We retired to bed around 3:30am.

Our first local pop song

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Watching TV this evening, there was a run down of local pop tunes in town. Number 1 in the chart was F.T. Island. It really has something for everyone! Hope you enjoy!

Day One - the all day flight!

2009-09-02T23:00:00.007+08:00

We flew Dublin to Hong Kong via London with Aer Lingus and Quantas, departing Dublin at 7:30h local time, connecting with Quantas flight QF30 at 13:20h. Actually as Aer Lingus partner with Quantas, our tickets and bags where checked and allocated straight through to Hong Kong, nice and handy. The flight to China is some 11 hours, stops in Hong Kong then continues onto Melbourne, Australia. We've actually been talking lately about making the trip to oz, if anything, flying Quantas really puts you in the mood!

Unlike lasts years flight with Virgin to Tokyo, this flight was mainly made up of Australian nationals. We had been hoping for the Chinese experience to start the moment we boarded the plane, but no, it was more an Australian feel to the flight and service.

The plane was a Boeing 747-400, yes that does have an upstairs! Back in economy we sat 10 to a row. This plane is massive. We had all the usual features you'd expect, on-demand movies (including lots which aren't out in the cinema back home), tv, radio, games and CDs from our seat. The food service was frequent and fine. We where stuffed with the constant food parcels!

As I'm typing his in flight and with another 4 hours until we land at 7:20h local time, here is some info about Hong Kong. It measures 1103 sq km and is divided into four major areas: Hong Kong Island to the south; Kowloon, a peninsula on the northern side of the harbour (where we are staying); the New Territories to the north connecting the region to mainland China and the Outlying Islands, some 234 of them scattered out into the South China Sea.

As you can tell we've been passing the time on the flight reading up on the city. We can't wait to arrive and will update later on our first impressions of the city.

It's going to be hard to stay awake. We flown throughout the night and will arrive at the start of their Thursday, we'll do our best!

Your Invitation to our Holiday Blog!

2009-09-02T08:42:00.002+08:00