HONG KONG

October 26, 2014

October 26th, Part 2

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All of us but Roberta and Otto (who had other things to do in Hong Kong) had elected to take the optional Hong Kong tour. Our tour guide was a non-stop comedian named Patrick. More...



We visited Victoria Peak where he became the official photographer, having couples pose kissing at the designated posing area. I strolled back to the main square and investigated the buildings and views from there... honestly, the view of the Central District of Hong Kong was shrouded in smog. (Welcome to China!) Some of my pictures were of the Sky Terrace building but as Patrick pointed out, you can always find a picture of IT on $20 HK. After Victoria Peak, we visited Aberdeen Village and went on a sampan ride there. We rode in circles through the harbour amongst a great variety of boats. Some were the ritzy "I'm rich and this is my toy" kind of boat and some were very functional (fishing). The most interesting were the ones which were used as homes. Patrick showed us the Bauhinia flower - illegal to pick but on a $2HK coin. We next visited ANOTHER jewellery factory. That was OK since I found a really nice souvenir of Hong Kong for myself there. We drove back to Aberdeen but parked in a different spot so we could take a boat to the Jumbo Floating Restaurant for lunch. (Dim Sum) The inside of the restaurant was very pretty but I couldn't help remembering what the backside of this barge-like building on the water looked like when we had passed it on our sampan ride.
After lunch, we went to the Stanley Street market. Alma and I wandered through the area and after visiting the beach front, we found an interesting stationary store. It's too bad we weren't as adventurous as some of the others who visited graves of Manitoba soldiers who died while on military duty in Hong Kong during World War II. In particular, Valerie's pictures of the headstones of some of these soldiers are quite historically interesting. We passed some other areas in Hong Kong but because of ongoing demonstrations, we skipped a couple of planned stops. Patrick was quick to point out homes of the rice and famous... and also the Ferrari-Maserati dealership!
Back at the hotel, we had dinner at City Place food stand... HOT DOGS!! After, a small group of us grabbed the subway and went to the Temple Street Market. There, my "big find" was 32 GB USB sticks in the shapes of many KOOL characters. So far, mine (a couple of pandas, a monkey, a BMW wheel, Garfield & a guitar) have all worked BUT evidently, some of the sticks (as reported by Roberta) are defective. Hmmm... the equivalent of $1 CND each... I bought six... no problem!