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Published: November 16th 2009
We arrived at Hong Kong after our 3rd sleeper train. It took 20 hours! We got the metro to our hostel which was at a place called Chunking Mansions. First impressions....not great. It is a huge building full of hostels/flats and shops on the bottom floor selling crap/phone cards/ sim cards / rude stuff etc. There are loads of immigrants standing outside and hassle you for fake watches/bags and tailored suits every time you walk in and out. Once you get used to it, its ok. Our room was nice anyway, although very small, it was upgraded so we had a double and single, so at least we had somewhere to put our crap. The bathroom was about 1m square and we had a window, which is quite a luxury, as some of them just look like a prison cell. It was very clean and the staff were lovely, we ended up staying 6 nights!
The weather for the first couple of days was warm, humid and sticky. We spent a few nights just sat on the harbour watching the sunset. We went to Temple Street night market, and had some lovely street food! Proper chicken sweet and sour hong
kong style and beef in black bean sauce with rice. Mmmm, was one of our favourite meals so far! Also cheap!
We bought a few bits and pieces at the market and sent them home so we dont add to the ridiculous weight of our backpacks! We have also sent most of our winter clothes home, to take off the weight a bit. Probabaly a bit premature in doing so, as the weather has turned drastically and its cold now!
We took the tram up to the peak, which is a viewing point and you can see Kowloon and Honk Kong island. We also went to a goldfish market, which is basically a street full of goldfish and pet shops! You can buy all sorts of fish, some of them are huge. You can even buy nemo and dory fish! Plus all kinds of tortoises, even huge ones that are the size of 2 footballs. They had loads of tiny cute puppies and kittens in the pet shops, I would have bought everything if I could.(No photos were allowed) They were soo cute! They are quite big on pets here, and like to ridiculously dress the dogs and put
them in bags. We even seen one dog with shoes on??
We had a nice steak one night in a Philippino steak house, it was about £3 for a huge steak and came on a sizzler, it was so hot you have to shield yourself with your napkin when they pour the sauce on. We've definetely had some nice food here. (I have just realised I mention food in every blog.....Im sure most of you expect it).
Very strangely we bumped into Claire and Jo, the 2 english girls we met in Xian!! How weird is that? So we sat with them for the night in Starbucks until we got kicked out. You never know, we could end up seeing them again at some point?!
We also visited 2 of the islands. The first was Cheung Chau just for the day, we had some nice seafood on the front, theres not much there, just a little fishing village but was nice to get away from the hustle and bustle for a bit! We also went to Lantau island and stayed for a few nights. We stayed in a hotel on the beach front with a swimming pool
but unfortunately the weather was rubbish, so we had a full day in our room watching tv! They had discovery channel and national geographic so we were happy enough!
We went to see the giant buddha on Lantau which was good, and I bought an I HEART HK t shirt..I actually love it, Craig is jealous.
We both love Hong Kong and will be returning one day as unfortunately we didnt get to go to the Happy Valley Races . We went to go on our last night and it was raining so was closed! Gutted. So we had a few drinks instead, well I had a few too many and was extremely hungover for our flight to vietnam...not good.
Craig also left his hat at the hotel, he is very upset.
Thats the end of the first leg of our journey, the time is going too fast!
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mam and dad
non-member comment
Is it Marge or Budda??
Well what can i say! WOW!! the pics are brill i bet you are having the best time ever, Craig fancy loosing your hat i can imagine how gutted you will have been, but i see Jen has lent you her hat, nice, the hotel on the beach looks lovely, i'm glad you are getting some nice food at last but you didn't have to go all that way for sweet'n'sour/beef inblack bean sauce ha!ha! you both look very healthy, fancy meeting the two girls again eh! not a good idea to have a hangover when you are traveling the next day Jen, but i don't need to tell you that now do i? Was that a jewellers you were looking in Jen? The sights you are seeing must be amazing this blog is a godsend to all us back home. take care of each other and stay safe. Miss ya loads mam and dadxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx