Blogs from Hong Kong, Asia - page 23

While the crowds have thinned, those still there have settled in for a while. Tents are set up along Connaught Rd, and makeshift study halls have been created so the students can keep up with their studies. There are families wandering around, older people taking selfies with tents in the background, and tourists checking it all out. High school students are there in uniform, and there were some uni students in their graduation cloaks. We even saw a couple having wedding photos taken with the protests in the background. Free drinks are bing provided, and there are increasing numbers of signs and posters. Overall though the mood is calm and quiet. The police are staying away, and the crowds are pushing non violent civil disobedience. Calm and peaceful, but no end in sight.... read more

Today is our last day in Hong Kong! I can't believe our trip is almost over! We will check out of our hotel tomorrow and leave for the airport about 12:30. We plan on sleeping in a bit, having the hotel buffet breakfast tomorrow, and packing up in the morning. We'll get to the airport the same way we got to the hotel (taxi to the Kowloon airport express station, then train to the airport). Today was our day tour to Lantau Island. We got picked up at a hotel around the corner about 8:20 this morning, the bus picked up a few more people at different hotels, then we all transferred to a different bus for the drive to Lantau Island. As I mentioned yesterday, Lantau Island is the largest of Hong Kong's outlying islands. ... read more

We were picked up in our hotel in Hanoi by the Vietnam Awesome Travel driver at 7:30 this morning, and we were off to the airport for our flight to Hong Kong. We have enjoyed visiting Hanoi. It is a pretty city, set on the lake, and the old quarter is so interesting, especially at night, and unlike anything we have experienced before. We are now in Hong Kong and it seems much more like a regular big city, without the character and traffic craziness of a city like Hanoi. The flight from Hanoi was only two hours, and was uneventful. Nobody was sitting in the window seat so we could spread out a bit. We landed about 1:30 and went through immigration and baggage pickup quickly. We had bought our MTR travel passes online so ... read more

A couple of days ago, we took an overnight train from Guilin to Shenzhen. Sadly this time we were right at the end of the carriage, and the other passengers in our compartment were very loud, so we didn't get a lot of sleep. Overall though, the sleeper trains have been a good way to travel, covering a lot of distance in relative comfort. At Shenzhen station, we walked across the border into Hong Kong - quite a few pieces of paper are used in the process of crossing! From there, we got the MTR to our hotel, near Austin station, in Kowloon. Yesterday afternoon, we walked to the harbour and sailed across on the star ferry. Whilst food here is quite close to prices at home, transport is still far cheaper, and you get a ... read more

Sleep seems to elude me as yet again I seem to be sharing a dorm with noisy Asian people, this time it seemed to be the boys who were noisy. Three of them kept coming and going for some reason and the girls taking showers etc seemed to take forever to sort themselves out, but finally by 1am things settled down finally! In the morning the boys left at an ok ish time so I waited until they had gone and the girls before I hit the shower. I had no plans for the day other than mooching around the shops. I could have done some sight seeing but I really wasn't in the mood and I had arranged to meet Bhavisha at 4pm. I tried to do my online checkin for my flight the next ... read more