Hong Kong

(We have had very unstable satellite access for quite a while now. They tell us it should soon improve. Everything else is still fabulous. We have had a change of port in April. We will go to Cartagena, Columbia instead of Puerto Moin, Costa Rica. They told us it is because it is a port in which we must anchor and use the tenders to get to shore. In Puerto Moin it is often difficult to use the tenders and right now they are experiencing very strong easterly swells making tender use even more difficult. The change doesn’t matter to us.)

We sailed into another busy container port on the island of Kowloon. There was a foggy mist covering the tops of the tall skyscrapers and mountains and we weren’t really sure where Central Hong Kong was from the QE2’s berth. As soon as the ship was cleared by local officials, we were down the gangway and off the ship to find out. The ship provided a free shuttle for us through the canyons of containers stacked 7 high and into Central Kowloon. We had plans with friends to go to the island of Lantau, but first we had to get to Hong Kong. We had no Hong Kong dollars, but the Star Ferry across Victoria Harbor to Hong Kong was free for senior citizens and took 8 minutes.

Then we set about finding a place to exchange our money because we knew everything wouldn’t be free. We were 10 feet from where the ferry to Mui Wo on Lantau would leave, but we couldn’t pay for a ticket. We were told that there was an HSBC across a footbridge over a large highway and into a mall, so we set off to find the bank. Finally we found it, only to be told that we would be charged about 12% to change money since we didn’t have an account in the US with HSBC. Our friend went to an ATM and changed enough money for all of us to use, so we found our way back through the levels of the mall to the footbridge and the ferry pier. The Hong Kong ferries are amazing! Each day they move thousands of people among the islands of Hong Kong. Some of the ferries are hydrofoils, some double decker, some old, some new. But all of them that we saw were clean and punctual.

We paid our half-price senior citizen fee for the 50-minute ride to Lantau, twice the size of Hong Kong Island and the largest island. Hong Kong Island has a population of 1.4 million while Lantau has about 84,000. We had been told to take the number 2 public bus when we got off the ferry and it was there waiting when we arrived. But, no one told us we would need to pay exact fare. So the six of us traveling together for the day, pooled our Hong Kong Dollars and managed to come close enough to the fare to not mind overspending a bit. The bus ride! The guidebook describes it this way, “The bus hurtles around hair-raising curves and up and down through lush countryside – not for the faint of heart.” Well, I was there anyway, faint heart and all! We went up and down and around hairpin turns for about 45 minutes and we were indeed hurtling. There were sheer drop-offs, the roadway went across dams, and in two places, the road was single lane. On the way up the mountain, I thought the lane closure was for construction, but coming back down, I saw that there had been huge rockslides that filled half the road. The construction was to try to remove the boulders and create a retaining wall for the cliff remaining beside the road. It was an exciting ride, but Jerry managed to take a nap on the return trip.

Lantau is a popular destination in part because of the Giant Buddha and the Po Lin Monastery. Both are on a plateau at an elevation of 2,421 feet – high enough for ear popping getting there. The Buddha is enormous, more than 98 feet tall and built only about 15 years ago. Adjacent to the Buddha is the Po Lin Monastery, famous for vegetarian lunches served family style in a plain dining hall. The food was excellent and abundant although we didn’t know what some of the dishes were. There is a large temple with an ornate interior that contains three bronze statues of The Buddha. We went to the temple after lunch and were wandering around just in time to witness the monks doing their afternoon chanting and bell ringing. What a treat that was for us. The smell of incense filled the interior of the temple and the surrounding area.

We went back to the bus stop for the number 2 bus to reverse our route and get back to the ship. A bus was there as we approached and we tried to board, but the driver waved us away. Why did he not let us on?? We had to line up on an island within a special area, then he picked us up. Again the fiddling around pooling our small Hong Kong dollars to get the exact fare – close enough.

Back on the ferry, only this time we were on a fast hydrofoil. It took us only about 20 minutes to return on this fast ferry. When we arrived in Hong Kong, we walked back to the huge mall where Jerry treated all 6 of us to a Starbucks! It is everywhere and just as delicious everywhere. One of our friends had broken his glasses so in the mall we found a Lenscrafters, they are everywhere! After purchasing glasses, we walked back to the footbridge, were amazed at the display of colored lights on all of the skyscrapers in the growing darkness. A beautiful sight.

Back again on the free ferry to Kowloon where after a short walk, shuttle buses were waiting to return us to the ship. We arrived back, had dinner at the Lido, and the ship left at 10 pm. Watching the ship sail away from Kowloon past the bright lights of Hong Kong was another spectacular display.

This is a place to return to.
Hong Kong