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February 3rd 2013

Published: April 15th 2013

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spike77

Moscow

View from my hotel!

OK first i wanna say sorry for not doing this blog while on my travels, but certain forces of nature prevented me from doing so, luckily i kept a detailed diary of my adventures so i could write this now I'm home.

Barcelona to Hong Kong via Moscow!

Well my first day of travels did not go well, my flight from Barcelona to Moscow was delayed by over an hour and when we finally landed we were even more late due to a blizzard which prevented us from landing for some 2 hours. This means i missed my connecting flight to Hong Kong, the airline (who shall not be named) kept me in the airport for over 5 hours before finally deciding to move us to a hotel as my new flight was not for another 24 hours! At first i thought this was great but when you realize you need a visa to enter Russia this becomes not so great, they basically had armed guards frog march us to the hotel, we had to remain in our rooms until dinner and breakfast were ready when they marched us under guard to a private room for us to

Kitchen

my hostel in HK

eat in, food was very basic but it was free. My situation was made worse by the fact that our bags were checked in all the way to HK so we were not allowed access to them meaning no clean clothes or toiletries, but the hotel had those little sample bottles of shampoo and shower gel which helped!

Arriving Hong Kong

After traveling for some 48 hours i finally made it to HK, unfortunately my problems did not end when i left Moscow, my bags had been automatically diverted to HK after i missed my flight and ended up in Shanghai and would be delayed a further 24hours. So once again i had no clean clothes or toiletries and i had to go shopping, when your in a new city and you don't know where things are its a problem! i had already checked into my Hostel in causeway bay and was amazed how good the property was, because i was staying here over the Chinese new year i booked it some 6 months in advance, i did not fancy the idea of hunting round HK for a good place with my 20 kilo rucksack so i

Bedroom

21 bed dorm in HK

did plenty of research and booked the "Yesinn @ Causeway Bay". My next stop after HK was China and i needed to get my visa sorted and with the Chinese new year coming up i knew the Travel office might be closed over this period and needed to sort this ASAP. luckily in HK most travel agents can help with this, i paid for a rush service due to the office being closed extra days over the holidays.

I had an early night and slept for over 12 hours which felt great, got up nice and early and helped myself to the free toast, tea and coffee offered by my hostel. I went out with my camera and decided to walk the length of HK island taking photos of the city, the weather was amazing, beautiful day sun shinning with blue sky's and mid 20s temperature so no need for a jacket. At 3pm my best mate "Orville" arrived from the UK to help me celebrate the Chinese new year, after the long couple of days it took me to reach HK i was so happy to see his smiling face. Every Thursday in HK there is

HK skyline

an organized pub crawl, they take you around town and show you some amazing bars which we would never have found on our own and cheap as well!! it was a great night and made some amazing new friends, we did 5 bars, 2 clubs and the long walk home was very tipsy.

Due to a slight hangover we did not do much on Friday, went for dinner and had some great Chinese food which I'm glad to say was under 10 euros with a drink, lots of people had said how expensive HK was and i really have to disagree! food was cheap, transport was cheap (Spent less then 10euros on the subway for the whole week!) accommodation costs higher then other places in Asia but where i stayed was soo nice i cant complain. We found that eating where the locals eat is the best, the food is good and cheap, most places have English menus or at least some nice pictures for you to point at. We decided to go see Kowloon and took the star ferry across the harbor which only cost 2HK$, without realizing the time we boarded the boat right as

Orville

Best Friend on HK pub crawl

the light show on HK island called "The Symphony of Lights" started at 8pm. this was simply beautiful, over 40 skyscrapers have signed up to this light show, covering there buildings with thousands of LED lights, some better then others but when put together it is simply breathtaking, no wonder it has been voted "Best Skyline" in the world!

Ocean Park

Saturday we decided to go ride some roller-coasters and went to Ocean Park in Aberdeen, this place is a great mix of theme park, zoo and aquarium. The park was decorated for the Chinese new year with flowers and decorations that are not normally there, the whole site is massive and the animals look like they are treated really well, the enclosures are among the best i have ever seen and it is the first time i have seen Pandas. The park is split in 2 halves and uses a cable car to connect the 2 pieces, some great views can be had of the park and the surrounding area from inside the cars. once we left the park we headed back to central HK and had dinner at Hard Rock Cafe, i used to work

HK pub crawl

over 100 people attend this every week!

for the company and always visit them when i am in the neighborhood so i can compare the restaurants.

Sunday was the eve of the Chinese new year and we decided to go see the big Buddha, what a mistake... bad idea trying to see a religious site on a religious day! Ques were over 3 hours long as people made their way to see the giant statue and pay their respects, instead we went back to Kowloon and got ourselves a good position for the parade through the center of town, we were 2 hours early but already the crowds had started to build up so we kept our place and had few beers. When the parade started it took over 2 hours to go round the route, over 20 floats with extra street performers from all over the world were on show! The whole show was amazing and such a great way to celebrate the end of the year of the Dragon. One of the reason i came on this trip is because i am a Dragon in the Chinese horoscope, i have always been fascinated with Asia and this was a great way to start my

Skyline

View of the Symphony of lights from the star ferry

2 month long trip.

Monday NY day

After standing for over 6 hours last night we had and early one, got up this morning bright and well refreshed, it was Orville's last day and we made our way to the 10,000 Buddha Monastery in Shatin. After the disaster with the Big Buddha the day before we didn't know what to expect but found the place to be fairly quiet, no ques to get in, no crowds of tourists which surprises me because it was FREE! Probably one of my favorite sites in Asia boasting over 12,000 statues of various sizes depicting the Buddha, beautifully kept, clean and tidy, the air was thick with incense that your eyes would water. The gorgeous weather added to the experience, we decided to have lunch in the temples vegetarian restaurant, we had "sweet and sour chicken (no meat)" and "deep fried taro fish (no meat)" both were amazingly tasty and all for under 5 euros. when we got back to central HK most of the town had been roped off ready for the fireworks display at 8pm, we hunted round town to find a good spot but seems everyone else

Skyline

Best in the world!

in HK had the same idea, luckily the display was soo huge it was difficult not to have a good spot. the display took over half hour and the air was thick with smoke when it was all over, we said our good byes to Orville who left us to get his flight home and back to reality while i went to find food in the Temple street night market with my new friends Richard, Kara, Kat, kathryn, Seb and Yannick. The area was very busy and we had few problems trying to find an empty table, we waited for ages but in the end it was worth it, Temple Street market is a great place for souvenirs but you need to barter.

The Peak Tram

After 3 previous attempts i finally made it to The Peak, the problem with this and any attraction that has some unusual method of transport is the ques. The fact that the carriage only takes about 40 people means that the wait was over 3 hours, the peak is the highest point in HK and the views are breathtaking, assuming you have good weather and i was lucky once again to

Ocean Park

flower displays for Chinese new year

have blue sky's and mid 20s in temperature. They have 2 shopping malls at the top full of souvenirs and restaurants which were not expensive, took plenty of pictures before heading home however we didn't want to wait another 3 hours to get the tram down so hoped on a very over crowded bus. Wednesday in HK all the museums are FREE, so met up with my new friends from the Peak Thorsten and Kamil, the museums were not great but since we didn't pay they were good after which we went to the "avenue of stars" and possed for lots of pictures with some random Chinese girls.

The Big Buddha

my last full day in HK and i finally made it to the BIG Buddha, to be honest i was disappointed as it takes too long to get there! you have to que for 3 hours just to get on the cable car which cost 200 HK$, the ride itself was good it takes about half hour to reach the other side, it was made good by the glass floor in the cable car so some great photos were taken. once you get off the cable car you

NY day Parade

1 of over 20 floats through HK

are dumped into this man made fake town that was built just to sell you tourist crap, the only shops there are 7eleven, Subway and Starbucks. once i reached the Buddha i half expected him to have big Micky Mouse ears as i felt like i was in some kind of theme park and not a world famous religious site!

The best part to my day was visiting the nearby fishing village called Tao, the small shacks where the fisherman lived were made of tin and perched on top of 2 meter high poles. the whole place looks untouched for over a hundred years, little shops selling dried fish, fresh fish, fish paste and some amazing street food like scallops on skewers grilled and covered with some herb butter and literally only hours off the boats!! a much better experience the the Buddha itself as i felt like i was getting a real insight into china!

Good bye Hong Kong

After 10 days in HK im ready to move onto my next country, China! i loved my time in HK, its an amazing city and cant wait to go back. if i had gone

NY day Parade

Street performers

any other time of year i feel a week would be enough, but because it was the Chinese new year there were extra attractions put on specially to celebrate! i now have a month in China visiting 4 cities followed by japan and then Thailand. i hope you liked my blog and I'll be writing ones for my other destinations soon.

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