Around the World in 55 Days: 2013-07-14

Written by Maura, photos and captions by Tom:

Flights 5 and 6 of this summer adventure were for this past weekend in Hong Kong. We were originally supposed to leave Taichung early Saturday morning, but due to the typhoon, we didn't take off until 6:00 pm. We got to the hotel in Hong Kong around 10 pm and spent the first night visiting the Temple Street Night Market very close to our hotel.

These booths went for several city blocks. Most of the stuff was much nicer than the "NO FART" signs to the right.

Then, we wandered down to the Avenue of the Stars (like Hollywood's Walk of Fame) waterfront promenade. From there you could see across the river to Hong Kong Island which had probably the most amazing skyline I have ever seen.

The Avenue of the Stars was a big tribute to film and Chinese film stars, complete with a few awesome statues like this one.

Taking nighttime landscape pictures with my camera took a long time. MANY pictures came out too blurry, but this skyline was too amazing to not try to capture.

See?

Bruce Lee was the biggest star (to my mostly ignorant mind, anyways) there, and he had the statue to prove it.

Saturday morning started with a trip to Stanley, a small fishing village on the far side of Hong Kong Island. We had to take the metro and then a bus to get there, but it was really nice. They had several beautiful temples and a great park with beautiful views all along the ocean.

We ate lunch on that pier to the left.

Then we went to Victoria Peak, the highest point around where you could see a breathtaking view of Hong Kong. However, it involved a terrifying tram ride up the mountain at a really steep angle pretty much the entire way. While I hated the ride up, it was worth it once we got to the top.

The ride up may have terrified Maura, but it did have awesome views like this throughout the trip.

It was absolutely amazing to see this huge metropolitan city with probably 100 skyscrapers pressed right up against the jungle with parts of it carved into the rain forest.

Even from this distance and angle, the city is too massive for my camera.

She's not holding on for dear life; Maura was actually perfectly content to enjoy the amazing view once we got off the tram.

This is a whole different side of the platform from the picture of Maura, which gives you an idea of the scope of the city.

While on Victoria Peak, we explored the walking trails they have through the forest and even discovered a very old stone staircase leading up the mountain. Well, what else can you do when you see an old stone staircase? We followed it of course!

It didn't help that there were lots of people on the original walking path, and NONE of them were going up this staircase, which was a little bit more overgrown and deserted-looking than this picture makes it appear.

We climbed this weaving path for about a half an hour before seeing a sign. Apparently we were on The Governor's Path. Back in the 1800s and early 1900s, the British governor of Hong Kong had a summer house on the peak and used to walk around the grounds on this path. We finally came out to a wide open area from which was even higher than the part of the peak the tourists go to and could see an almost 360 degree view of the city, the jungle, and the ocean.

This is the view from the back of Victoria Peak. There are islands for as far as the eye can see out there, mostly mountainous and seeming to be uninhabited.

This was the view from a random overpass on the way back to the tram. The amazing views aren't just confined to the actual tourist attractions.

We then headed back down the peak on the tram. Apparently, they don't turn the seats around when you go back down, so while going up you are facing forwards going up what felt like a 30 degree angle, going down you are facing backwards going down what felt like a 30 degree angle - not fun. Anyway, we made it back to central Hong Kong Island and boarded the Star Ferry back to the Kowloon side of the city where our hotel was located.

Okay, fine this wasn't the ferry...

...This was.

It was almost 8:00 now, and every night Hong Kong puts on a light show with lasers set to music so we got a seat on the water front looking out towards the island (along with several hundreds of other people). While waiting for the show to start, we and the people around us noticed some dark clouds coming over the island, then the clouds covered the peak, then we watched as they crossed the river, and before you know it, it was raining on us.

You can see that it was cloudy, but the view was completely clear, and the weather seemed perfect for the light show.

Until 2 seconds later, when you can see that the buildings are obscured. About 2 second later, I was worried that my cameras and wallet were permanently toast because I was completely saturated with rain.

But that doesn't really do it justice. We went from completely dry, not one drop of rain, to standing under a huge waterfall. We were completely drenched and everyone ran to hide under a covered part of the waterfront, so we all squeezed in and watched the show; no torrential downpour where you can't see 20 feet in front of you was going to stop the Hong Kong light show, apparently. Mostly, we listened to the music and towards the end of the 15 minute show, the rain completely stopped and we could see at least some of the lights. At this point, we couldn't do anything but laugh, which was a good attitude to have for the 10 block walk back to our hotel. Once we were in dry clothes again (which involved a few hours with a hair dryer, since we didn't bring any extra clothes or wallets), we went out to dinner at a Michelin rated restaurant across the street.

Monday morning, we checked out of the hotel and headed to the Hong Kong Museum of History. It was a fascinating place which documented the history of Hong Kong from Paleolithic time to 1997, when Britain gave Hong Kong back to China. It had lots of very interesting displays, on the aboriginal Taiwanese people, the waves of immigration from mainland China, the opium wars and British rule. If you ever go to Hong Kong, I highly recommend it.

It seriously starts with an exhibit about the Hong Kong area from 400,000,000 years ago.

They covered a lot of local traditions and religious practices in this area.


Maura may have been laughing at the dumb teenagers who were literally climbing on artifacts for pictures before getting chastised by the guards.

There were a couple of sections where they had life-size boats from different eras.

Then we hopped on the MRT (metro) and visited the Chi Lin Nunnery (Buddhist) and Nan Lian Gardens. They were both beautiful and again it was amazing to see the city and rain forest pressed together so closely. Unfortunately, it poured the entire time we were there, hence the ponchos.

They didn't allow pictures inside of the Nunnery, but this is a picture of the front of it. The courtyard area is actually a lotus pond (more than 1, I suppose), but we stuck to the covered paths because of the rain.

Taken from the steps of the Nunnery and looking into the Nan Lian Garden across the street.

This is all right smack dab in the middle of a huge, bustling city, although it didn't feel that way from the inside at all.

We had hoped to visit the Tian Tan Buddha, but the rain delayed us and we weren't going to make it all the way there before our flight, so we checked on Trip Advisor and there was an amazing Taoist Temple about 200 yards from us, so we went and it was gorgeous. It was still raining, but we enjoyed ourselves before heading to the airport.

All of the temples that we have visited are very much active; that women with the burning incense sticks is praying to the gods in this particular temple, as are dozens of people out of the camera's view.