The Peak and a Floating Restaurant

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The day dawned clear, relatively, so I was pleased to put The Peak back on my schedule. (Just for the record, the proper name is Victoria Peak, but everyone seems to call it The Peak.) on my way to the peak Tram, I stopped at the big bank buildings in the financial district. The HSBC building has two bronze lions out front and one of them still bears shrapnel wounds from WWII. (See photos) I wanted to go inside the Bank of China building because foreign visitors are allowed to ascend to the 43rd floor to the observation deck. I don't know why they don't want locals going up there, but a passport is required to get past the front desk. I didn't have mine with me and they wouldn't accept the color photocopy that I keep in my wallet. Oh well, I didn't want to go up in their stupid building anyway. I continued to the Peak Tram station and rode that up to the top. (See photo) It is surprisingly steep and riders are pushed well back into their seats at certain points along the way. The view from the top was partially obscured by the haze in the air, but I admired it nonetheless. (See photo) I had a coffee at the Pacific Coffee shop that looks north out over the city and then walked to the other side and found a viewpoint over the south side of the island. Originally I intended to go back down via tram and then take a bus around to the south side to the town of Aberdeen, but decided to go by taxi directly from the Peak. It turns out there is no direct road and I ended up going a long way around, but at least I got to see more of Hong Kong island this way. The taxi dropped me right at the pier for the sampan ferry to the floating restaurant known as Jumbo. (See photo of pier and of the four-story floating restaurant). It's true that Jumbo is more than a little overdone, but it is also popular and I enjoyed the experience of eating there. BTW, I had mixed vegetables and an order of dumplings. (See photo) Jumbo keeps live fish, crabs, etc in tanks on the lower level and patrons can view them. (See photo) I didn't ask if one could choose one's dinner while it was still swimming around. The ferry from the restaurant took a little tour around the harbor (See photo of sampan) and then dropped me fairly near the bus terminal. I got the bus back to central Hong Kong and then walked to the Man Mo Temple. (See photo) Man and Mo are two Chinese deities and worshipping them involves the burning of huge spirals of incense. (See photo) I wandered around the steep streets for a little while and ended up back at the hotel. Today was the last full day of my trip. In a way I am sorry to see it end, but I will be glad to get back home to Maggie. I plan to publish one more blog entry before I close, but it may take a couple of days because of the long journey tomorrow.

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