We started the day by waking up early to go on the Lantau
360 tour that would bring us to Lantau Island in the new territories. That
island is also where the airport is.
When we got up it was raining out though not any lightning or
thunder. The rain was moderately strong
by this point. We got cleaned up and had
a quick breakfast in the lounge before getting downstairs perhaps a minute or
two ahead of schedule and the tour bus was already waiting for us. Of course it
was really raining by now. The initial
bus was a pickup bus only and we rode on to two more stops before being brought
on to the tour operator’s location.
After a few minutes we were sorted onto the correct tour bus and
starting on our way.
Our tour guide was named Roger and while he was Chinese it
was obvious he learned English outside of Hong Kong. I thought his accent was
probably from Australia or New Zealand but I later learned he grew up in
Manchester, England. He was a glib fast talker who made a lot of jokes
throughout the tour but apparently for those who weren’t native English
speakers he spoke much too fast. Even the guy from South Africa who had been
living in the states for many years thought he spoke to fast. I did find him funny but I couldn’t help but
joke back with him at times.
The first stop of the tour was at the Avenue of Stars near
the harbor. Of course since it was raining out the guide sold it as a bathroom
and Starbucks stop to try to keep himself out of the rain. It did slow down a
bit while we were there though and although we started with ponchos on we took
them off a few minutes afterward. We got
down to the statue of Bruce Lee and took a couple pictures. We also took a few minutes
to get a hot chocolate at the Starbucks.
The second stop was at a “Jewelry Factory” for the company
TSL. As with the other factories we visited during the tour it was an over
glorified reason to visit a jewelry store.
The information was brief and all geared towards selling their stuff. After
that it was too many minutes in the store.
I don’t think anyone bought anything on this stop and the guide sold
this stop also as a bathroom break saying we would have a couple hours before
we could stop if we didn’t go here. I
don’t think he gets a cut of the sales so he was disinterested in it, unlike
the Chinese tour guide in Beijing.
From there it was on the bus for a moderately long ride to
Lantau Island where we would take cable cars up to the big Buddha. We had opted to take the “Crystal Car” which
meant the glass bottom car. The rain had basically stopped by now but we had
all the heat and humidity still. The car we got on had all the windows closed
and I opened as many as I could because I think we would have been steam cooked
if someone didn’t. The ride takes about
25 minutes and goes through a couple of turns in ground stations before it
finally reaches the top. I am not sure why I was less bothered by the glass
bottom cable car (which does reach heights that are enough that should bother
me) than I would with a cable car that is normal does to me. I would think it would be a more nervous
experience but honestly I had less issue with it than I normally do. Especially
for how long it is. In any event the guy from South Africa and a few Chinese
guys were on the car with us and of course everyone took a lot of
pictures. Many pictures focused on the
idea of the glass bottom whether we were over land or water. You can also see the airport from the cable
cars too.
At the top we waited for the guide to arrive on another car
for a few minutes before he took us to the vegetarian lunch at the monastery. The food was all served family style and there
was a lot of different kinds of things such as mushrooms with broccoli, lemon
bean curd strips, mixed vegetable dishes, vegetable fried rice vegetable spring
rolls, rice chips and sweet rolls. It all came with Chinese tea as is to be
expected. The food was enjoyable though of course I would have loved something
meat based.
After the meal was over we had free time and walked around the
monastery then on up to the big Buddha and through the Buddha museum. The
Buddha is upstairs about 270 steps and in the heat and humidity it was a mildly
unpleasant climb. At least the rain had
fully stopped before we did all of this.
We even had reasonably good views of the statue and the surrounding area
though the clouds remained. The
monastery and the statue took up most all of our time so we didn’t get around the
gift shop area. Roger said that Daniela and
I were close to his record for being the latest to get back to the meeting
point.
We boarded an island bus and rode down to the fishing
village next. There he walked us through
the village quickly and we got on a boat that rode through the village of stilt
houses and then on out past the breakwater where we actually got to see some
pink dolphins. The pink dolphin is apparently the national symbol of Hong Kong.
We saw a bunch of them leap out of the water and such but it was nearly
impossible to get pictures or even videos of them because each incident was so
brief we couldn’t really see it, focus on it and get pictures. I tried to get video but really only got one
splash. Too bad but they were very pink
and it was cool to see. We then turned back around headed into the village
after a few minutes and were given some free time where we bought some water
and I got replacement batteries for my camera.
We took a quick pit stop then it was time for the bus back to the cable
cars.
We rode the Crystal Car back also. There was a brief point
where the car stopped for maybe 3 or 4 minutes but since it was a nervous thing
it felt like 10 or 20. I am not sure why
it stopped. It must not have been a technical reason for the stop to be short.
Perhaps someone had to get off at one of the stations the cars don’t stop at or
something? In any event, this time it
was just the South African named Craig and Daniela and myself on the car. We
were a bit nervous for a few minutes but the car did start moving again and the
rest of the journey continued without incident.
We waited for the tour guide and were again put back on the bus this time
to take us back to our hotels. We were
dropped off at about 4:30 and then basically after all the draining heat we
took a small rest in the room for about an hour. We got cleaned up then headed
back out for dinner and some shopping.
We decided to try to go to the Tsim Sha Tsui stop and search
out dinner. I was not sure which exit to take out of the Tsuen Wan line (the
red line) so we just sort of got out and wandered around. We weren’t fully sure
what to get but I had in my mind to find the Italian restaurant I had eaten at
3 years ago and our wandering did provide me with the ability to find it. It is
called La Taverna and is at the end of a dead end street. I am not sure the name of the street. When we
got in there was live entertainment in the form of a man and woman singing to
music played on a keyboard. They were mainly singing older easy listening style
American songs. Stuff like John Denver
and so on. We ordered some garlic bread and a bottle of the house red wine. I
had the penne ai quattro formaggio and Daniela had spaghetti with shrimp. Sort of a shrimp scampi. Both the meals were really good. The wine was
only average. After we finished the meal
we each had dessert. Daniela’s was named after Sophia Loren though I forget the
full title. It was puff pastry with orange cream. It was tasty. I got the
tiramisu and it was very good too.
I think we took a bit too long at dinner but we were having
a good night of it. Still we had to get to the markets before they closed. We
took the train to the Jordan stop and walked to the Night Market on Temple
Street. We thought we wanted the night
market for the things Daniela was looking for but it turned out that they didn’t
have what she wanted at all so we got back on the train and headed to the Lady’s
Market again which was much nearer to our hotel. Unfortunately we got there around
11 or so and everyone was beginning to close up shop. This meant we had to rush around in circles
trying to deal for what Daniela was looking for in quick order as the vendors
shut down. It was not a fun experience
honestly and very exasperating for Daniela who had a time limit to get a
reasonable deal. In any event she bought a carry-on bag for her sister which
was the main goal. It was a fake Coach (or maybe Gucci) bag that looked
obviously fake for the big Gs on it instead of the Cs it should have been.
After the shopping we just headed back to the hotel and
called it a night. It was hot and sweaty and I was completely done and drained
from it all so it was easier to fall asleep.
We set the alarm for 5am to get packed up completely before we headed to
the airport.
The pictures from Hong Kong Day 11 can be found here.
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