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Sunday, February 1’st. I’m leaving Aarhus with the airport bus to Billund at 8.15. The flight leaves for Amsterdam at 10.55. There are a few hours of waiting at Schiphol before take off for Hong Kong at 15.15. The trip to Hong Kong takes about 11 hours. It’s a boring trip. The time difference is 7 hours, so somewhere above Mongolia Sunday turnes into Monday.
Monday, February 2’nd
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It’s 9:30 local time as I arrive in Hong Kong. I get hold of my luggage, and leave the airport. The first thing I do is buying an Octopus-card, the very useful Travelcard that was invented in Hong Kong. The airport-train to Kowloon is smooth and fast. From the station there’s a free shuttle-bus for my hotel YMCA Salisbury. I’m a little early, but my room is ready, so I get the key-card to room 1367. It’s on the 13’th floor, and all facilities is included – even a small basket with fruit. There’s a nice view across the Victoria Harbour out the window. |
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My plan against jetlag is a few hours of sleep now. I haven’t slepped much during the flight, so it works out ok. At 3 the tourist is ready for the firsl look around. The first trip is with one of the green Star Ferries across the harbour to Hong Kong Island. If you didn’t know, you would expect it to be one large shopping-mall. In the evening I head for the Avenue of Stars. It’s close to my hotel. The views of the skyscrapers across the harbour are spectacular. At 8 they start a show – the Symphony of Lights – which is very nice. All the buildings are lit by blinking colourful lights and from the hills above laser-lights beam across the buildings as well. |
| Finally I take a walk around neon-lighted Kowloon. I walk up Nathan Road, where there’s every chance to buy an almost real Rolex-watch, having a foot-massage or getting a new suit made by Pakistani tailors that a pretty annoying trying to do a sell.
Videoclip from "A Symphony of Light" - click here |
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Tuesday, February 3’rd
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It’s a nice hotel. There’s even a free copy of the South China Morning Post outside my door every morning. Today I have 2 trips to take care of. The first one is for one of the island that is a part of Hong Kong. This one is Lantau. I take the metro to Tung Chung. From there, there’s a a cable-car to Ngong Ping. There are 2 sights at Ngong Ping. One of them is the Tian Tan Buddha. That’s a huge Buddha-statue on top of a hill. There are 260 steps to the top. The statue is 23 m high, weighs 202 tons, and has ears that reminds of those of Goofy. |
| The second sight is Po Lam Monastery. When you get there, you expect the whole thing to be on fire. But it’s not. It’s only people burning incense. There’s a lot of life around here and a very strange smell. For the Buddhist their religion is a personal thing. They don’t gather in large groups but keep their religion to themselves. They just pass by, put fire to 3 of the smelly things and usually have 3 prayers – one for a long life, one for good health and one for prosperity. After this I head back the same way as I came to the place. |
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The second tour later on the afternoon also includes some different kind of transportation. That’s another something between a cable-car and a tram that is almost vertical. It’s on Hong Kong Island and takes me to “The Peak”. From here, there’s a great view across Hong Kong and Victoria Harbour. As it is the case in this country the whole thing is surrounded by a huge shopping-mall. I am there at the right time of the day. That’s just before the sun goes down. That gives me the chance to see all the buildings in Hong Kong in daylight and in the dark, lightened by all the neon. According to Lonely Planet this should be one of the best views in the world. I haven’t seen them all, but this is certainly nice.
Videoclip from "The Peak" - click here
Videoclip from "The Peak Tram" - click here |
| Wednesday, February 4’th Most people think that Hong Kong is a huge city full of high buildings everywhere. That’s not the case. Hong Kong is also a green area, with hills, nature and places hard to get to. Around this area they have built New Towns. That’s a cluster of skyscrapers – up to 40’Th floor or so. Then they build infrastructure – good roads, and good public transport, and put about ½ mio. people into the New Town. |
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Tin Shui Wang is such a place. I go there this morning. Actually not to see Tin Shui Wan, but instead to see the Hong Kong Wetlands Park just outside. This is a nature-reserve with birds and other small animals, which has been turned into a semi-sight. I spend a few hours out here in the green nature with high rising buildings in the background. |
| The second tour of the day is for a sporting-event. The most important sport in Hong Kong is horse-racing. The horse-racing cathedral is Happy Valley. I take a tram to the racecourse. There’s room for about 50.000 spectators and the whole thing is surrounded by huge buildings. Horse racing is for everyone in Hong Kong – high and low. Outside the VIP-entrance the photographers are gathered to take pictures of the local celebrities. All the rest of us take another entrance. When you’re a tourist you don’t have to pay to get inside. Just show your passport. I seems like most people in Hong Kong has turned up tonight. There’s one meeting each week – on Wednesdays – on Happy Valley. The people of Hong Kong are crazy about gambling, and horse-racing is the only thing legal for gambling. Not that it matters for most people.
Videoclip from Happy Valley - click here |
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Thursday, February 5’th.
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It’s another day with 2 tours. The first one starts on my favourite boat fro Star Ferry. For nearly no money you cross the harbour between Kowloon and Hong Kong Island. From the Star Ferry terminal I walk to Pier 5. From there I take a “Fast Ferry” to Cheung Chau. Cheung Chau is another Hong Kong island. The trip takes about 30 minutes, and when you arrive it’s like you’re in another world. There are no high buildings, no cars – and no shopping-malls!! Instead there’s a nice little fishing-village that’s really nice. Then there are some local shops run by local families, a few temples, and on the harbour you can buy fresh caught fish directly from the boats. There are no really big sights out here, but the Pak Tai Buddhist-temple is pretty nice. After a few hours of walking around and hanging out on this place, I head back on a “Slow Ferry” for Hong Kong Island. The Slow Ferry takes about an hour. |
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The second trip is more hectic. It starts at my local metro-station Tsim Sha Tsui, from where I take a small trip to Prince Edward. From there it’s a short walk to Yuen Po Street Bird Garden. Here is a phenomenon that I have also found in Singapore. A lot of men meet with their birds in a cage to talk. The men talk – and so does the birds. The cages are always very nicely made. Right next to the garden you can buy more birds, bird-food etc – so there’s a lot of noise. From the bird-garden I walk to Tung Choi Street Market – also known as the women's market. That’s a long road full of small stalls selling mainly clothes, shoes and other ordinary products. The crowd is huge, and it’s really a task to get through the market. |
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From there I walk to another market. It’s The Temple Street Night Market. Since it’s not really evening yet, it’s pretty relaxed at the moment. This is the men’s market – full of electronics, gadgets and other strange stuff. Finally I head down Nathan Road with more neon-shops, and back home to my hotel. The tourist has been busy today, so he rewards himself with the nice international buffet at the hotel.
Videoclip from the Bird Garden - click here
Videoclip from Nathan Road - click here |
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Friday, February 6’th The first trip of the day is to Fanling – another New Town. Out there – in the middle of an industrial area – my first tour of the day starts. It’s the Lung Yeuk Tau Heritage Trail. Now I’m really off the beaten track. It’s an exiting walk for about 4-5 km, taking me past the Tang Chun Ling Ancestral Hall. That was built in the memory of the founder of the Tang-clan. From here I head on and pass 5-6 Walled Cities. They are old societies with a protecting wall around the small city. These walls were all made to protect against enemies. Nowadays there are no enemies, so technically you can just walk through the gate and into the city. But in nearly all the cities they’ve placed a nasty dog just at the entrance to make sure no trespassers get inside. I really don’t want to discuss with dogs like that, so I take a look at the cities from the outside. |
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The walk ends up in Siu Hang Tsuen, from where a green minibus – 56K – takes me back to Fanling. Where I was almost on my own on tour 1, this is not the case on tour 2. It’s across the harbour to hyper-hectic Hong Kong Island. First I try the escalator to Midlevel. It’s supposed to be the longest escalator in the world. In the morning it runs down to the office-building in central – but they reverse it at 10 am so it runs up to the residential areas. From Midlevel I walk down Hollywood Road to Man Mo Temple. There’s a lot of activity around here, with sticks being burnt and a strange smell all over. |
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From here I head for the Chinese area of Sheung Wan. Here you’ll find a lot of small shops – and especially Herbal-shops selling alternative medicine. If you’re feeling ill, just get inside a Herbal-shop – tell them what's wrong – and they will cook you a soup to cure it. Finally I head back for my ferry and back to my hotel at Kowloon.
Videoclip from Star Ferry - click here |
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Saturday, February 7’th
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Today’s trip is for the amusement-park Ocean Park. It’s huge and it’s popular. It’s so popular that the new Disneyland really hasn’t been much of a success. You can see that on the people that wants to take route 629 out there. There’s a long line for the bus, but they run all the time, so the queue is moving fast. At Ocean Park you’ll find everything needed for a place like this. And as a bonus there’s a dolphin show, an aquarium and 4 pandas. So it’s a good place to spend a few hours, before all the kids gets to annoying.
Videoclip from the Aquarium - click here |
| Then my plan was to walk to Aberdeen, which is not a harbour-city in Scotland, but an old fishing-village in Hong Kong, now mainly consisting of tall buildings. The walk is long and not very interesting, so instead I hire a small old boat – a Sampan – to take me there by sea. Then I also get’s the chance to take a look at all the fishing boats and houseboats in the Aberdeen Harbour. Back in the old days, it was common to live on the water in a houseboat. Now it’s rare. I jump off my Sampan at the quay in Aberdeen, where I find a bus that takes me to Central, where my old favourite The Star Ferry takes me back to the hotel. |
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Week 2 |