Blogs from Wan Chai, Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong, Asia

Ni hao from Hong Kong. We landed late evening and made our way to our hostel and we're greeted by the lovely Eleanor. A quick check in and dump of the bags and we were in a bar in time for happy hour!! Result. The G and T's were flowing as we had a good catch up. Eleanor had to leave us to catch her flight and we decided it was prob best to go to bed (we had been up since 4am!) The next morning we were up really early to get to the Chinese passport office to try and get our visas. If you didn't already know, we had an absolute nightmare in London trying to get them and gave up in the end. Numerous people had assured us we could get them (with ... read more

Well thats it the last day but we still had plenty planned. Up we got, showered and dressed, bags packed and had one last look at the view from our room before checking out. Once we checked out of we headed to the metro to the Admiralty area and a walk up the hill through Hong Kong Park to catch the Peak Tram to the top of Victoria Peak on Asia's oldest funicular tram which runs to the top through the high rise buildings. At the top is Peak Tower an anvil-shaped building with shops and restaurants within it. Once inside you can pay to go out onto the roof, this is worth doing just for the 360 degree views over Hong Kong and the surrounding area, simply amazing, it was a hazy day but the ... read more

Hello my fellow travellers! Today has been a good day filled to the brim with Chinese heritage sites. I begun the day with visit to the Ten Thousand Buddhas Monastery (fair warning, it's not actually a monastery since there are no monks living here, the temple is run by laymen). It's a sweaty hike up a steep hill to reach the monastery and the path there is lined with golden statues. I must admit that some of the statues here are really creepy and not in the good creepy awe-inspiring way but in a just plain creepy way. Regardless it's a nice place to visit and definitely worth you time. After the visit to the monastery I made my way to the Che Kung Temple which is absolutely amazing, it is a Ming Dynasty temple dedicated ... read more

What a lazy day. Slept until 08:30 and then worked on computer looking for info about Lijiang Airport. Finally by 11:30 I was out and going to deliver my bag of laundry. Whereas my few pieces cost $335HKD at the Nina Tower Hotel here at the downtown Laundry for 6 pieces I paid $60HKD. The clothes will be ready by six tomorrow. Then into the MTR at Central and to Admiralty to find the Flagstaff Museum where the teapot collection of K.S.Lo is housed. The man became rich by selling Vitasoy products all over the world. He donated his collection of teapots to the city when he heard that Flagstaff House was going to be turned into a museum after being the residence of the Commander of British Forces in HK. In 1984 it became the ... read more

HongKong Central is where all the money is. People are dressed to the nines; men in suits and ties with wrinkle free white shirts sporting real shoes, women in tailored outfits with matching pumps, handbags, hairdoos and makeup, all traipsing past Gucci, Paiget, Lalique, Cartier, Bulgari /Bulgravi, Mont Blanc and all those other names too. And amognst this jungle of designer wear and high finance housed in ever higher reaching glass spindles n the sky who comes along but Barbara in her MEC pants, beat up hiking boots and raspberry red backpack. I am wearing a Ralph Lauren shirt knockoff with polo rider and altered made-to-fit-the-length-of my-arm-sleeves. And I did buy comfy black and yellow sandals at the Stanley Street Market. I trudged up Ice House Road to number 38 and found the MiniCentral Hotel ... ... read more