China our way! A 23 day trip report of independent travelers in May 2009.
Jun 2nd, 2009, 08:39 AM
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China our way! A 23 day trip report of independent travelers in May 2009.
Hong Kong/China May 7 – 31, 2009
We're a 54/55 year old couple from the United States who love to travel. We used Europe as our training grounds in independent travel. I’ve been interested in a trip to China for a couple of years, but decided to wait until the Olympic preparations were completed before going. As I began to think about how to travel in China, I assumed it would be best to go with a tour group. We don’t speak a word of Mandarin and the tour prices seemed reasonable. The problem was, we don’t like to travel as a group. We don’t like to be told where to go, what amount of time we should spend in a location, etc. etc. After looking at our choices, and the locations most tours visit, I convinced my husband we could do this trip independently. He didn’t mind, since I’d be doing all the preparations! Preparation is the key. Very few people will understand any English. You need all the locations you’ll visit printed out in Mandarin. Details aren’t to be ignored. Bring all the information you can with you. I hope this trip report will make this task easier for you. I’ll provide all the details I can, that made our trip go so smoothly on the whole.
Our trip went very, very well. Yes, there were some problems along the way, but there all always some problems in traveling.
I booked all but one of our inter China flights on www.ticket.9588.com before we left. I booked them about 2 weeks prior. This web site lists all the fares. You can enter any dates, so it’s easy to see what last minute flights will cost. It’s fairly easy to see what the low price of a ticket will be. The biggest problem to this way of booking tickets for me was a flight schedule change twice. The company refunds your money and you must rebook tickets. They don’t just change the time for you. The refund takes 1 month to receive. One such change happened the day we were leaving, so it was quite stressful for me. More on that situation in the trip report. Once in China, don’t contact 9588 or Ctrip about an existing situation. They can’t help you at all. You must deal with the airline directly. These companies take credit cards, and issue e-tickets. This worked wonderfully. As an average, each flight we took averaged $100usd. Some a bit more, or less, but on average you can plan on $100 per ticket.
Booking tickets in China, we went to an agency which no one spoke English. Cash is required, and you’re issued paper tickets, not e-tickets. We needed help with this so our guide for this day translated for us. She also led us to the agency which would have been difficult to find on our own. In the end, the price was the same as it was on ticket.9588 before we had left for our trip. If the flight is heavily booked, the ticket prices actually rise at the last minute. Most of our flights were full. Not too many empty seats to be had.
Using FF miles through Delta we booked our trip on Continental Airlines. The seats available were starting in Hong Kong, & returning from Beijing. I hoped to do this trip in the opposite direction because the Dragon Boat Festival in Hong Kong would have been a fun thing to watch on May 28. In the end, I’m so happy we started in Hong Kong and saw the countryside of China before the cities. We loved the countryside so much, and felt we saw more of the real population before we arrived in the big cities. It was much more relaxing, and as it turned out, the weather was much better.
Our Itinerary:
Hong Kong May 8 – 11
Ping’an/Longji Rice Terraces May 11, 12
Yangshuo area May 12 – 15
Lijiang May 15 – 19
Chengdu May 19 – 23
Xi’an May 23 -25
Beijing May 25 – 30
We're a 54/55 year old couple from the United States who love to travel. We used Europe as our training grounds in independent travel. I’ve been interested in a trip to China for a couple of years, but decided to wait until the Olympic preparations were completed before going. As I began to think about how to travel in China, I assumed it would be best to go with a tour group. We don’t speak a word of Mandarin and the tour prices seemed reasonable. The problem was, we don’t like to travel as a group. We don’t like to be told where to go, what amount of time we should spend in a location, etc. etc. After looking at our choices, and the locations most tours visit, I convinced my husband we could do this trip independently. He didn’t mind, since I’d be doing all the preparations! Preparation is the key. Very few people will understand any English. You need all the locations you’ll visit printed out in Mandarin. Details aren’t to be ignored. Bring all the information you can with you. I hope this trip report will make this task easier for you. I’ll provide all the details I can, that made our trip go so smoothly on the whole.
Our trip went very, very well. Yes, there were some problems along the way, but there all always some problems in traveling.
I booked all but one of our inter China flights on www.ticket.9588.com before we left. I booked them about 2 weeks prior. This web site lists all the fares. You can enter any dates, so it’s easy to see what last minute flights will cost. It’s fairly easy to see what the low price of a ticket will be. The biggest problem to this way of booking tickets for me was a flight schedule change twice. The company refunds your money and you must rebook tickets. They don’t just change the time for you. The refund takes 1 month to receive. One such change happened the day we were leaving, so it was quite stressful for me. More on that situation in the trip report. Once in China, don’t contact 9588 or Ctrip about an existing situation. They can’t help you at all. You must deal with the airline directly. These companies take credit cards, and issue e-tickets. This worked wonderfully. As an average, each flight we took averaged $100usd. Some a bit more, or less, but on average you can plan on $100 per ticket.
Booking tickets in China, we went to an agency which no one spoke English. Cash is required, and you’re issued paper tickets, not e-tickets. We needed help with this so our guide for this day translated for us. She also led us to the agency which would have been difficult to find on our own. In the end, the price was the same as it was on ticket.9588 before we had left for our trip. If the flight is heavily booked, the ticket prices actually rise at the last minute. Most of our flights were full. Not too many empty seats to be had.
Using FF miles through Delta we booked our trip on Continental Airlines. The seats available were starting in Hong Kong, & returning from Beijing. I hoped to do this trip in the opposite direction because the Dragon Boat Festival in Hong Kong would have been a fun thing to watch on May 28. In the end, I’m so happy we started in Hong Kong and saw the countryside of China before the cities. We loved the countryside so much, and felt we saw more of the real population before we arrived in the big cities. It was much more relaxing, and as it turned out, the weather was much better.
Our Itinerary:
Hong Kong May 8 – 11
Ping’an/Longji Rice Terraces May 11, 12
Yangshuo area May 12 – 15
Lijiang May 15 – 19
Chengdu May 19 – 23
Xi’an May 23 -25
Beijing May 25 – 30
Jun 2nd, 2009, 10:03 AM
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Before ever starting our trip, some problems crept up on us. Hong Kong was extremely worried about the swine flu that effected Mexico so badly. They had just quarantined a whole hotel with 300 guests for 7 days because of one case of the swine flu. I didn’t want to arrive in Hong Kong, just to be quarantined. A few months earlier we booked the YMCA Salisbury Hotel on the Kowloon side of Hong Kong on booking.com. Several good recommendations for this hotel can be found. Rates even dropped at the last minute. We decided since this hotel is so large, the odds would be much better to avoid quarantine, by booking a small hotel. There was no charge on booking.com to cancel our reservation.
Tickets.9588.com emailed and told us our flight from Shenzen-Guilin was cancelled. We were to leave at 9:40 a.m. on May 11. The new flight time was 8:00 p.m. This was going to jeopardize our trip to Ping’an. I emailed Lilly, the guide we were using to drive to Ping’an. She didn’t rely for a long time, so I booked a reservation at a Guilin hotel which could be cancelled, and waited for advice from Lilly.
The JIA boutique hotel in Hong Kong was recommended on Fodor’s. The rates were more than 50% off to book our dates, and it’s located on Hong Kong Island. We booked this wonderful, small hotel directly on the hotel’s web site, http://www.jiahongkong.com/JIA.html which cost HKD 3,285.00 for 3 nights. The location was wonderful, the room perfect, bed so comfortable. The TV rotates so you can watch it in the sitting area, or the bed area. Breakfast is included, as is wine each evening and cake in the afternoon. Wi-Fi is free in the lobby as are newspapers. We were ready to leave!
I bought an iphone just a week before our trip so we could keep in contact with our family by email and SKYPE for phone calls. This worked so well, and the calls were cheap. We also emailed all our flight confirmations and trip plans to ourselves, so we’d have a back up available while gone. Wi-Fi was always available in our hotels so we didn’t feel cut off from the world or our family. I didn’t see internet cafes often in China. I’m sure they were there, but hard to find. We did use Starbucks a couple of times for Wi-Fi also!!
May 7
Our first flight was Continental airlines from CVG to Newark. Our favorite airport restaurant had an outlet here, Vino volo in terminal C! Tapas and wine, a great way to spend some time while waiting for our international flight to Hong Kong! Flying a 777 with individual screens on the back of each seat and an electrical outlet between our seats, we settled in for the 16 hour flight. We sat in row 44, which was another tip from Fodor’s. Economy seating has 3 seats across, but row 44 has only 2 seats, so it’s much more comfortable. The toilets being directly behind us didn’t create a problem as I had feared. The flight was only 2/3 full. We were served 3 meals during the flight, all were horrible. The Ice cream was good though! With so many movie choices and some sleep, the flight wasn’t as bad as I feared it might be. We arrived in Hong Kong around 7:45 p.m.
May 8
All passengers needed to fill out a health form stating where we’d been in the prior 2 weeks, and where we were staying in Hong Kong. They were checking all passengers’ temperatures with the walk by sensor. It took only 20 minutes from the time we landed to get out into the arrivals hall after clearing Immigration and Customs. Our first stop was at the ATM just across from the circular desk which sells Octopus Cards, to get some money. Then we bought 2 Octopus Cards, one for each of us for our transportation. These were Hong Kong $150 each, of which $50 was the deposit, and $100 for use. We needed to add money to this card for our 2 ½ day stay as we used public transportation a lot. The deposit is refunded as you leave Hong Kong if you return the card, minus a small fee.
Walking out of the arrivals hall, following the bus signs, exit from the middle of the terminal turning right down the ramp to the waiting buses. The first bus in line was ours, A11 City bus with the words North Point Bus on the front of the bus. This is 40 rmb each, which is paid by putting the Octopus Card on the reader when you enter. ($65HKD round trip, but we weren’t doing a round trip). We were sitting on the bus 30 minutes after we deplaned. The airport wasn’t crowded this evening. We needed to get off at stop #14, Sugar Street. Inside the bus a scroll tells you what bus stop is next. It’s a bit confusing though and we actually exited the bus one stop too soon, at Times Square. You don’t need to swipe your card as you exit this bus from the airport. The web site listing the City buses and stops is http://www.nwstbus.com.hk/content/de...irportServices
http://www.mtr.com.hk/eng/facilities/lm.html This site has all the MTR maps. It was the best map of Hong Kong I could find. A great resource. Thanks Cicerone for these links!!
An alternative way to town from the airport is the Airport Express Train which costs $100HK. It’s faster, but we found the much less expensive bus quick and easier to use since we didn’t need to transfer as we would have needed to do if we used the Train. If you do use the train and stay at the JIA, you’ll need to connect to the Blue Hotel shuttle bus H2 which stops across the street at the Regal hotel.
The evening city lights were beautiful as we drove to Hong Kong Island. After asking a couple of people for directions to JIA, we found it and were greeted warmly. Our room was on a high floor and we never heard any street noise. The Causeway Bay metro stop was nearby which proved to be very useful. 2 bottles of free water were provided daily. There is a small refrigerator in the room, a sitting area, desk and marble bathroom. Very stylish. My husband was thrilled with our choice of hotels!
Tickets.9588.com emailed and told us our flight from Shenzen-Guilin was cancelled. We were to leave at 9:40 a.m. on May 11. The new flight time was 8:00 p.m. This was going to jeopardize our trip to Ping’an. I emailed Lilly, the guide we were using to drive to Ping’an. She didn’t rely for a long time, so I booked a reservation at a Guilin hotel which could be cancelled, and waited for advice from Lilly.
The JIA boutique hotel in Hong Kong was recommended on Fodor’s. The rates were more than 50% off to book our dates, and it’s located on Hong Kong Island. We booked this wonderful, small hotel directly on the hotel’s web site, http://www.jiahongkong.com/JIA.html which cost HKD 3,285.00 for 3 nights. The location was wonderful, the room perfect, bed so comfortable. The TV rotates so you can watch it in the sitting area, or the bed area. Breakfast is included, as is wine each evening and cake in the afternoon. Wi-Fi is free in the lobby as are newspapers. We were ready to leave!
I bought an iphone just a week before our trip so we could keep in contact with our family by email and SKYPE for phone calls. This worked so well, and the calls were cheap. We also emailed all our flight confirmations and trip plans to ourselves, so we’d have a back up available while gone. Wi-Fi was always available in our hotels so we didn’t feel cut off from the world or our family. I didn’t see internet cafes often in China. I’m sure they were there, but hard to find. We did use Starbucks a couple of times for Wi-Fi also!!
May 7
Our first flight was Continental airlines from CVG to Newark. Our favorite airport restaurant had an outlet here, Vino volo in terminal C! Tapas and wine, a great way to spend some time while waiting for our international flight to Hong Kong! Flying a 777 with individual screens on the back of each seat and an electrical outlet between our seats, we settled in for the 16 hour flight. We sat in row 44, which was another tip from Fodor’s. Economy seating has 3 seats across, but row 44 has only 2 seats, so it’s much more comfortable. The toilets being directly behind us didn’t create a problem as I had feared. The flight was only 2/3 full. We were served 3 meals during the flight, all were horrible. The Ice cream was good though! With so many movie choices and some sleep, the flight wasn’t as bad as I feared it might be. We arrived in Hong Kong around 7:45 p.m.
May 8
All passengers needed to fill out a health form stating where we’d been in the prior 2 weeks, and where we were staying in Hong Kong. They were checking all passengers’ temperatures with the walk by sensor. It took only 20 minutes from the time we landed to get out into the arrivals hall after clearing Immigration and Customs. Our first stop was at the ATM just across from the circular desk which sells Octopus Cards, to get some money. Then we bought 2 Octopus Cards, one for each of us for our transportation. These were Hong Kong $150 each, of which $50 was the deposit, and $100 for use. We needed to add money to this card for our 2 ½ day stay as we used public transportation a lot. The deposit is refunded as you leave Hong Kong if you return the card, minus a small fee.
Walking out of the arrivals hall, following the bus signs, exit from the middle of the terminal turning right down the ramp to the waiting buses. The first bus in line was ours, A11 City bus with the words North Point Bus on the front of the bus. This is 40 rmb each, which is paid by putting the Octopus Card on the reader when you enter. ($65HKD round trip, but we weren’t doing a round trip). We were sitting on the bus 30 minutes after we deplaned. The airport wasn’t crowded this evening. We needed to get off at stop #14, Sugar Street. Inside the bus a scroll tells you what bus stop is next. It’s a bit confusing though and we actually exited the bus one stop too soon, at Times Square. You don’t need to swipe your card as you exit this bus from the airport. The web site listing the City buses and stops is http://www.nwstbus.com.hk/content/de...irportServices
http://www.mtr.com.hk/eng/facilities/lm.html This site has all the MTR maps. It was the best map of Hong Kong I could find. A great resource. Thanks Cicerone for these links!!
An alternative way to town from the airport is the Airport Express Train which costs $100HK. It’s faster, but we found the much less expensive bus quick and easier to use since we didn’t need to transfer as we would have needed to do if we used the Train. If you do use the train and stay at the JIA, you’ll need to connect to the Blue Hotel shuttle bus H2 which stops across the street at the Regal hotel.
The evening city lights were beautiful as we drove to Hong Kong Island. After asking a couple of people for directions to JIA, we found it and were greeted warmly. Our room was on a high floor and we never heard any street noise. The Causeway Bay metro stop was nearby which proved to be very useful. 2 bottles of free water were provided daily. There is a small refrigerator in the room, a sitting area, desk and marble bathroom. Very stylish. My husband was thrilled with our choice of hotels!
Jun 2nd, 2009, 12:46 PM
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Thanks for all the help you provided thursdaysd! Zen Garden in Lijiang was a gem!
May 9
Deciding to start our day by going to The Peak, we took the subway to Central and started walking uphill. Bamboo scaffolding was scattered throughout the streets. We ended up at the zoo instead which was small, but has very pretty palms trees and grounds. Small pockets of people were practicing their Tai chi even though it was quite humid. The area was very pleasant. We couldn’t find the peak tram though. A very nice woman walked us quite a distance and showed us where to find it. There is no way we would have found this on our own. This spot was actually a stop on the way up the hill. There is a stop request button you push, and if there is room on the next tram for more passengers, it’ll turn green and you can expect a tram shortly. It was quite steep in this spot, so the people on the tram had the added adventure of stopping on the steep incline! We were able to get on, which saved us a long walk downhill to find the station. We used our Octopus card for payment. I didn’t find the area at the top of the peak offending as some do. It was spacious, had several restaurants, and if you walked up the many escalators there is a higher viewing platform for a small extra fee of 20rmb. There were no crowds this morning so taking photos wasn’t a problem. The air was hazy and heavy so our photos aren’t as clear as we’d like.
After spending an hour here we took the tram back to the bottom where we walked through Hong Kong Park. It was Saturday and a few couples were posing for wedding photos. One groom was holding 2 stuffed animal cows in the photos! Wedding photos are quite a production in China. All over this country we saw couples posing for elaborate photos. In the small lake dozens of turtles were sunning themselves on the rocks. I don’t know why some turtles are treasures in the parks, and others are in the markets ready for a dinner cook pot. Large posters were hung on message boards about the Prevention of Human Swine Influenza. The History of Tea museum is in this park so we visited it. We know nothing about the tea industry so the museum was somewhat interesting. A large aviary is in this park so we started walking up the hill to enter it. We stopped, thinking about birds, flu, cleanliness, maybe it’s better not to visit all these birds right now, so we passed on this site.
Where was Admiralty subway stop??? Walking for a long time, searching for it, we were stumped. Finally we found someone who could understand our English and told us to go to the mall. There in the bottom level of a beautiful mall is the subway stop. Signage was poor outdoors. Guess everyone just knows it’s there. Even with a good map from online, we were lost all the time in Hong Kong! We found all signage poor or nonexistent in China for travel sites that should be marked. Maps in mainland China are impossible to find also. Or if you can find one, it’s all in Chinese so is of no help. When you enter a site, maybe they’ll have a map you can buy of a site, but most likely the map will just be on a wooden board, with no way to remember the vast site.
I love outdoor markets, especially food markets. They’re usually so interesting and full of great photo opportunities. The Wan Chai area has some so we took the subway from Admiralty to Wan Chai and exited at A3. From my notes: Walk across Johnston Rd to Stone Nullahl Rd and Cross Street. This is the area of the Markets, including Tai Yuen Street , Tai Wo St. and Wan Chai Rd. (tips from Cicerone) The fish market, meat market, dried fish, live chickens, geese hanging, incense shops, tea shops, all make for great photos! Walk up to Stone Nullahl rd and look at the Pak Tai Temple, which is larger and more interesting. I actually found this to be a rather simple temple and not a must see.
Returning to Central we enjoyed a great bowl of noodles at Tsim Chai Kee on Wellington Street, directly across the street from Mak’s noodles. Tsim’s was crowded and Mak’s was empty. We asked the others at our table the best way to handle these noodles! We’re new at this and it takes some practice eating such long noodles! After lunch we watched through the window of Mak’s the noodle making process.
The Mid levels escalator is very close to these noodle restaurants so we rode it a bit. It’s not too exciting but it’s fascinating comparing old Hong Kong shops and buildings, with the new architecture. Mountain Folkcraft was a shop I was interested in seeing. It’s located at 12, Wo On Lane nearby. To reach the store walk up D'Aguilar Street toward Lan Kwai Fong, then turn right onto Wo On Lane. The shop is full of arts, crafts and antiques from all over China. It’s a wonderful shop, with prices that seemed a bit high. I bought a pretty kite here for our granddaughter. It barely fit into our suitcase!
Jet lag hit us hard, so we took the subway back to Causeway Bay and slept a bit back at the very comfortable JIA hotel. Later today we’ll visit Stanley and Aberdeen.
May 9
Deciding to start our day by going to The Peak, we took the subway to Central and started walking uphill. Bamboo scaffolding was scattered throughout the streets. We ended up at the zoo instead which was small, but has very pretty palms trees and grounds. Small pockets of people were practicing their Tai chi even though it was quite humid. The area was very pleasant. We couldn’t find the peak tram though. A very nice woman walked us quite a distance and showed us where to find it. There is no way we would have found this on our own. This spot was actually a stop on the way up the hill. There is a stop request button you push, and if there is room on the next tram for more passengers, it’ll turn green and you can expect a tram shortly. It was quite steep in this spot, so the people on the tram had the added adventure of stopping on the steep incline! We were able to get on, which saved us a long walk downhill to find the station. We used our Octopus card for payment. I didn’t find the area at the top of the peak offending as some do. It was spacious, had several restaurants, and if you walked up the many escalators there is a higher viewing platform for a small extra fee of 20rmb. There were no crowds this morning so taking photos wasn’t a problem. The air was hazy and heavy so our photos aren’t as clear as we’d like.
After spending an hour here we took the tram back to the bottom where we walked through Hong Kong Park. It was Saturday and a few couples were posing for wedding photos. One groom was holding 2 stuffed animal cows in the photos! Wedding photos are quite a production in China. All over this country we saw couples posing for elaborate photos. In the small lake dozens of turtles were sunning themselves on the rocks. I don’t know why some turtles are treasures in the parks, and others are in the markets ready for a dinner cook pot. Large posters were hung on message boards about the Prevention of Human Swine Influenza. The History of Tea museum is in this park so we visited it. We know nothing about the tea industry so the museum was somewhat interesting. A large aviary is in this park so we started walking up the hill to enter it. We stopped, thinking about birds, flu, cleanliness, maybe it’s better not to visit all these birds right now, so we passed on this site.
Where was Admiralty subway stop??? Walking for a long time, searching for it, we were stumped. Finally we found someone who could understand our English and told us to go to the mall. There in the bottom level of a beautiful mall is the subway stop. Signage was poor outdoors. Guess everyone just knows it’s there. Even with a good map from online, we were lost all the time in Hong Kong! We found all signage poor or nonexistent in China for travel sites that should be marked. Maps in mainland China are impossible to find also. Or if you can find one, it’s all in Chinese so is of no help. When you enter a site, maybe they’ll have a map you can buy of a site, but most likely the map will just be on a wooden board, with no way to remember the vast site.
I love outdoor markets, especially food markets. They’re usually so interesting and full of great photo opportunities. The Wan Chai area has some so we took the subway from Admiralty to Wan Chai and exited at A3. From my notes: Walk across Johnston Rd to Stone Nullahl Rd and Cross Street. This is the area of the Markets, including Tai Yuen Street , Tai Wo St. and Wan Chai Rd. (tips from Cicerone) The fish market, meat market, dried fish, live chickens, geese hanging, incense shops, tea shops, all make for great photos! Walk up to Stone Nullahl rd and look at the Pak Tai Temple, which is larger and more interesting. I actually found this to be a rather simple temple and not a must see.
Returning to Central we enjoyed a great bowl of noodles at Tsim Chai Kee on Wellington Street, directly across the street from Mak’s noodles. Tsim’s was crowded and Mak’s was empty. We asked the others at our table the best way to handle these noodles! We’re new at this and it takes some practice eating such long noodles! After lunch we watched through the window of Mak’s the noodle making process.
The Mid levels escalator is very close to these noodle restaurants so we rode it a bit. It’s not too exciting but it’s fascinating comparing old Hong Kong shops and buildings, with the new architecture. Mountain Folkcraft was a shop I was interested in seeing. It’s located at 12, Wo On Lane nearby. To reach the store walk up D'Aguilar Street toward Lan Kwai Fong, then turn right onto Wo On Lane. The shop is full of arts, crafts and antiques from all over China. It’s a wonderful shop, with prices that seemed a bit high. I bought a pretty kite here for our granddaughter. It barely fit into our suitcase!
Jet lag hit us hard, so we took the subway back to Causeway Bay and slept a bit back at the very comfortable JIA hotel. Later today we’ll visit Stanley and Aberdeen.
Jun 2nd, 2009, 01:58 PM
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The bus terminus, is located at ground level, under Exchange Square (交易廣場) near Central subway stop. This area is a bit complicated so give yourself enough time to find it. We took bus #6 from this location to Stanley, sitting upstairs in the 2nd row of seats. This enabled us to see the wonderful views during the trip over the mountain. The drive didn’t take too long, less than an hour. We didn’t care for the shops or atmosphere here, but I did buy some baby clothes for our new grandson, who is just 1 ½ months old!! If you want to buy children’s clothes, this is where you want to go. Great prices on so much merchandise. The waterfront area is nicer with several restaurants, but we didn’t eat here. Many families were just relaxing along the coast and more couples were having their wedding photos taken.
Bus 73 towards Aberdeen left from the same parking lot that bus #6 dropped us off. We had to wait a bit for the bus and had a nice talk with a teenage girl who was living in Hong Kong for the last year. She loved it but was returning to the U.S. soon. Riding the bus to stop #26, the Aberdeen Fish market/ Pier area, Aberdeen Praya Road, (we asked the driver to tell us when to get off) we found the pier directly across the street. Here’s the chart of bus stops, it’s in the 2nd half: http://www.nwstbus.com.hk/routes/rou...pe=D&company=5
While planning this trip I hoped we could visit Lamma island. The kaido ferry leaves from this location to the island. Lacking the time for this, and exhaustion, we took a Sampan ride around Aberdeen harbor instead. We loved the views and were the only 2 passengers on the pretty wooden boat, decorated with red Chinese lanterns and birdcages. The 30 minute ride was $15 and the owner pointed out all the houseboats, dogs that lived on the houseboats, and told us about the area. The tall apartment building next to the cemetery is having a difficult time finding tenants. You don’t want to live right next to a cemetery. Men were practicing rowing their Dragon Boats in the harbor. At the end of our time it was dusk and we decided to get dropped off at the Jumbo restaurant so we could look around. I wasn’t interested in dinner here. After a quick tour, we decided to leave, taking the Jumbo ferry back across. They weren’t operating the ferry to the pier area, only to the parking area. We were lost. We walked and walked trying to find the location where we began. I can’t believe it’s that hard to find, but it was dark by now and we didn’t find the pier. Instead a kind gentleman told us to walk to the fire house and find the bus stop for Bus 42 back to Causeway bay. I believe he said bus 38 & 77 also went to Causeway bay.
Back “home” we were too tired to go to a nice restaurant like “Ingredients” where I had hoped to eat. Instead we picked out a small local eatery close to JIA. What an experience this was. I ordered chicken in a clay pot, and it had lots of bones cut up in the chicken soup. Not to filling or appetizing. My husband had another noodle dish which was much better, but spicy! A roll of toilet paper adorned our table! I guess this is your napkin, or to wipe your nose from the heat of your food??? It was pretty amusing to me! Lots of local flavor this evening.
TV was covering stories of families who survived the earthquake in Sichuan province last May. It was sad, although the coverage tried to be very upbeat. One family said they wanted to be a complete family again. We found the coverage of this sad anniversary so interesting during our stay. There was a lot of singing between the family’s stories. Lots of hope for the future. We found that Chinese music is quite nice!
Bus 73 towards Aberdeen left from the same parking lot that bus #6 dropped us off. We had to wait a bit for the bus and had a nice talk with a teenage girl who was living in Hong Kong for the last year. She loved it but was returning to the U.S. soon. Riding the bus to stop #26, the Aberdeen Fish market/ Pier area, Aberdeen Praya Road, (we asked the driver to tell us when to get off) we found the pier directly across the street. Here’s the chart of bus stops, it’s in the 2nd half: http://www.nwstbus.com.hk/routes/rou...pe=D&company=5
While planning this trip I hoped we could visit Lamma island. The kaido ferry leaves from this location to the island. Lacking the time for this, and exhaustion, we took a Sampan ride around Aberdeen harbor instead. We loved the views and were the only 2 passengers on the pretty wooden boat, decorated with red Chinese lanterns and birdcages. The 30 minute ride was $15 and the owner pointed out all the houseboats, dogs that lived on the houseboats, and told us about the area. The tall apartment building next to the cemetery is having a difficult time finding tenants. You don’t want to live right next to a cemetery. Men were practicing rowing their Dragon Boats in the harbor. At the end of our time it was dusk and we decided to get dropped off at the Jumbo restaurant so we could look around. I wasn’t interested in dinner here. After a quick tour, we decided to leave, taking the Jumbo ferry back across. They weren’t operating the ferry to the pier area, only to the parking area. We were lost. We walked and walked trying to find the location where we began. I can’t believe it’s that hard to find, but it was dark by now and we didn’t find the pier. Instead a kind gentleman told us to walk to the fire house and find the bus stop for Bus 42 back to Causeway bay. I believe he said bus 38 & 77 also went to Causeway bay.
Back “home” we were too tired to go to a nice restaurant like “Ingredients” where I had hoped to eat. Instead we picked out a small local eatery close to JIA. What an experience this was. I ordered chicken in a clay pot, and it had lots of bones cut up in the chicken soup. Not to filling or appetizing. My husband had another noodle dish which was much better, but spicy! A roll of toilet paper adorned our table! I guess this is your napkin, or to wipe your nose from the heat of your food??? It was pretty amusing to me! Lots of local flavor this evening.
TV was covering stories of families who survived the earthquake in Sichuan province last May. It was sad, although the coverage tried to be very upbeat. One family said they wanted to be a complete family again. We found the coverage of this sad anniversary so interesting during our stay. There was a lot of singing between the family’s stories. Lots of hope for the future. We found that Chinese music is quite nice!
Jun 3rd, 2009, 06:15 AM
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Thanks for your encouragement. Here's the next installment:
May 10
Sunday morning, Mother’s Day, a trip to the flower market seemed like a good way to start our day after a pleasant breakfast in our hotel.
I wasn’t sure if Mother’s Day was celebrated in Hong Kong, but there were several signs hung in the shops, and even a TV station interviewing shoppers, for a story we saw on the television stations that evening. I’m a mother of 3, grandmother of 6, so today was a special day for me also! The flower market was large and well stocked, with vendor’s still setting up the outdoor booths when we arrived. It is about a 10 minute walk from the Prince Edward MTR Station to reach the market on Kowloon Island.
A bit further on is the Bird Market/Yuen Po Street Bird Garden which is open 7 a.m. – 8 p.m. I quite enjoyed this area. It was early and the men had arrived only a bit earlier, and were visiting each other. Some had their shirts rolled up exposing their belly’s. It was hot and humid. They hung their birds in bamboo cages in the trees. I loved taking photos of this and they were quite amused with me and smiled a lot. In the shops grasshoppers were bundled up in packages as food for the birds. One man was repairing bird cages. Luckily we strolled this market in the early morning because just as we left a huge tour group from a cruise ship arrived and the park/market area was flooded with people.
Using the MTR maps from the web site I posted earlier, it’s easy to find where the goldfish streets are located. They were disappointing to me. Plastic bags of fish, hanging outside of shops, turtles for sale, etc. but nothing to special. The couple of photos I took look pretty, but this isn’t an area you must see. This area was filled with bamboo scaffolding. Another outdoor market is located in this area was which was much more interesting.
Back on the MTR we traveled from Mong Kok (change lines) to Diamond Hill station, exit C2, where the Chi Lin Nunnery is located. It’s easy to find, just 5 minutes or less walk from the MTR station. This Buddhist monastery is so beautiful, built in Tang Dynasty architecture, wooden construction, I believe. The grounds, ponds, bonsai specimens and architecture is amazing, with the modern Hong Kong skyscrapers in the background. It’s fantastic, don’t miss this site! The Nan Lian Gardens 7a.m. - 9 p.m. with free admission, are located just outside the Nunnery and are not to be missed. The gardens are filled with water features, bridges, Tang Dynasty-style wooden structures and rocks. A pretty teahouse is located here if you want a relaxing break.
Leaving the gardens we walked back to the MTR and took it one stop to Wong Tai Sin to see the Wong Tai Sin temple黃大仙祠. I was happy we stopped at Chi Lin Nunnery first since we enjoyed this location much more than the temple. Many people were lighting incense here.
Celebrating Mother’s Day with a Dim Sum lunch at Tao Heung Super 88 located in the Silvercord Mall was so delicious! Someone mentioned this restaurant in their trip report noting how wonderful the food was. This is on the 3rd floor of Silvercord Mall, southwest side of Kowloon Island. www.taoheung.com.hk Shop B, 3/F., Silver Cord, 30 Canton Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, KLN. Business Hours: 7:30am - 1:00am. Now that I look at the web site they have several locations.
The restaurant was full of families enjoying dim sum. They give you 2 menus I think and a form to fill out selecting your food choices. Once completed signal a waiter over to take this paper. While waiting for your food selections they’ll bring even more plates to your table for you to select if you want. We selected a couple of these. Everything was so very delicious. Our bill was just $18 USD for 6 types of dim sum and tea.
Nearby is Kowloon Park. This park is very large and pretty, but it was so full of large groups of people just gathered together, and people bothering you to buy things, that we felt very uncomfortable. It’s very different from the lovely parks we visited in China. We walked through it as quickly as possible, as we wanted to visit Hong Kong museum of history. Take MTR to Tsim Sha Tsui exit E to visit this museum. The excellent Story of Hong Kong exhibition in this museum took us over 2 hours to visit. This is well worth the time, and the location is very attractive. Much of the tip of Kowloon, & the Nathan road area, we didn’t like at all. The area around this museum and the Chi Lin Nunnery is much nicer.
Leaving the museum we walked toward the coastline. This was our first view of the Hong Kong skyline which is stunning! It was fun seeing the hotels along the coast, walking the Avenue of Stars, going inside the grand theater and noting where the Salisbury YMCA hotel was located. We were so happy we stayed on Hong Kong Island instead. Near the Clock tower is the entrance to the Star Ferry. Taking the short ferry ride across the harbor was scenic, but a short ride. It was thrilling sailing across on this famous ferry though! We waited for the ferry longer than the time it took to sail across. If we had stayed on this side I think we’d be taking the metro across more often than the ferry. Once we arrived at Central we checked out Hong Kong Station so we could see how to transfer here tomorrow for our trip to Elements Mall where the China Link Bus Station is located. Since our flight time was changed from the morning to the evening we could just take the metro to Elements mall to catch this bus. Early in the morning we would have needed a taxi for this trip instead.
Returning to our hotel, we enjoyed some time in the lobby of the JIA hotel using the free wifi and enjoying a glass of wine as we relaxed. The problem with starting our trip in Hong Kong is that there are such fabulous areas to enjoy in the evening, fabulous restaurant, but we weren’t adjusted to the time change yet, so were to tired to stay up and take advantage of this. We did need dinner though, so we just walked over to Time Square where a huge mall is located. There are several restaurants in this mall, so we selected one and had dinner here. Our hope was to find a location that showed the Formula One race this evening, but we couldn't locate anywhere to watch it. Someday we’ll need to return to Hong Kong when we can enjoy its nightlife. This wasn’t the time for it. Sleep was more important.
May 10
Sunday morning, Mother’s Day, a trip to the flower market seemed like a good way to start our day after a pleasant breakfast in our hotel.
I wasn’t sure if Mother’s Day was celebrated in Hong Kong, but there were several signs hung in the shops, and even a TV station interviewing shoppers, for a story we saw on the television stations that evening. I’m a mother of 3, grandmother of 6, so today was a special day for me also! The flower market was large and well stocked, with vendor’s still setting up the outdoor booths when we arrived. It is about a 10 minute walk from the Prince Edward MTR Station to reach the market on Kowloon Island.
A bit further on is the Bird Market/Yuen Po Street Bird Garden which is open 7 a.m. – 8 p.m. I quite enjoyed this area. It was early and the men had arrived only a bit earlier, and were visiting each other. Some had their shirts rolled up exposing their belly’s. It was hot and humid. They hung their birds in bamboo cages in the trees. I loved taking photos of this and they were quite amused with me and smiled a lot. In the shops grasshoppers were bundled up in packages as food for the birds. One man was repairing bird cages. Luckily we strolled this market in the early morning because just as we left a huge tour group from a cruise ship arrived and the park/market area was flooded with people.
Using the MTR maps from the web site I posted earlier, it’s easy to find where the goldfish streets are located. They were disappointing to me. Plastic bags of fish, hanging outside of shops, turtles for sale, etc. but nothing to special. The couple of photos I took look pretty, but this isn’t an area you must see. This area was filled with bamboo scaffolding. Another outdoor market is located in this area was which was much more interesting.
Back on the MTR we traveled from Mong Kok (change lines) to Diamond Hill station, exit C2, where the Chi Lin Nunnery is located. It’s easy to find, just 5 minutes or less walk from the MTR station. This Buddhist monastery is so beautiful, built in Tang Dynasty architecture, wooden construction, I believe. The grounds, ponds, bonsai specimens and architecture is amazing, with the modern Hong Kong skyscrapers in the background. It’s fantastic, don’t miss this site! The Nan Lian Gardens 7a.m. - 9 p.m. with free admission, are located just outside the Nunnery and are not to be missed. The gardens are filled with water features, bridges, Tang Dynasty-style wooden structures and rocks. A pretty teahouse is located here if you want a relaxing break.
Leaving the gardens we walked back to the MTR and took it one stop to Wong Tai Sin to see the Wong Tai Sin temple黃大仙祠. I was happy we stopped at Chi Lin Nunnery first since we enjoyed this location much more than the temple. Many people were lighting incense here.
Celebrating Mother’s Day with a Dim Sum lunch at Tao Heung Super 88 located in the Silvercord Mall was so delicious! Someone mentioned this restaurant in their trip report noting how wonderful the food was. This is on the 3rd floor of Silvercord Mall, southwest side of Kowloon Island. www.taoheung.com.hk Shop B, 3/F., Silver Cord, 30 Canton Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, KLN. Business Hours: 7:30am - 1:00am. Now that I look at the web site they have several locations.
The restaurant was full of families enjoying dim sum. They give you 2 menus I think and a form to fill out selecting your food choices. Once completed signal a waiter over to take this paper. While waiting for your food selections they’ll bring even more plates to your table for you to select if you want. We selected a couple of these. Everything was so very delicious. Our bill was just $18 USD for 6 types of dim sum and tea.
Nearby is Kowloon Park. This park is very large and pretty, but it was so full of large groups of people just gathered together, and people bothering you to buy things, that we felt very uncomfortable. It’s very different from the lovely parks we visited in China. We walked through it as quickly as possible, as we wanted to visit Hong Kong museum of history. Take MTR to Tsim Sha Tsui exit E to visit this museum. The excellent Story of Hong Kong exhibition in this museum took us over 2 hours to visit. This is well worth the time, and the location is very attractive. Much of the tip of Kowloon, & the Nathan road area, we didn’t like at all. The area around this museum and the Chi Lin Nunnery is much nicer.
Leaving the museum we walked toward the coastline. This was our first view of the Hong Kong skyline which is stunning! It was fun seeing the hotels along the coast, walking the Avenue of Stars, going inside the grand theater and noting where the Salisbury YMCA hotel was located. We were so happy we stayed on Hong Kong Island instead. Near the Clock tower is the entrance to the Star Ferry. Taking the short ferry ride across the harbor was scenic, but a short ride. It was thrilling sailing across on this famous ferry though! We waited for the ferry longer than the time it took to sail across. If we had stayed on this side I think we’d be taking the metro across more often than the ferry. Once we arrived at Central we checked out Hong Kong Station so we could see how to transfer here tomorrow for our trip to Elements Mall where the China Link Bus Station is located. Since our flight time was changed from the morning to the evening we could just take the metro to Elements mall to catch this bus. Early in the morning we would have needed a taxi for this trip instead.
Returning to our hotel, we enjoyed some time in the lobby of the JIA hotel using the free wifi and enjoying a glass of wine as we relaxed. The problem with starting our trip in Hong Kong is that there are such fabulous areas to enjoy in the evening, fabulous restaurant, but we weren’t adjusted to the time change yet, so were to tired to stay up and take advantage of this. We did need dinner though, so we just walked over to Time Square where a huge mall is located. There are several restaurants in this mall, so we selected one and had dinner here. Our hope was to find a location that showed the Formula One race this evening, but we couldn't locate anywhere to watch it. Someday we’ll need to return to Hong Kong when we can enjoy its nightlife. This wasn’t the time for it. Sleep was more important.
Jun 3rd, 2009, 06:36 AM
#13
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This is a wonderful report!
I'm traveling along with you to Hong Kong as if I've never been there before! It's such a great, fresh viewpoint!
Please keep up the good work - love the links as well!
I'm traveling along with you to Hong Kong as if I've never been there before! It's such a great, fresh viewpoint!
Please keep up the good work - love the links as well!
Jun 3rd, 2009, 09:18 AM
#14
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Thanks easytraveler! We hope to return someday. More days are needed here, there's so much to do.
May 11
Today we’re going to fly from Shenzhen to Guilin. These flights cost much less than flights from Hong Kong to Guilin. When I booked our flight, not long ago, there was a morning flight which was perfect since we were traveling to Ping’an in the Longji rice terraces tonight. One day before we left the U.S. for Hong Kong we received an email from 9588, the ticketing service we used, stating that the flight we booked had just been canceled. There were no other morning flights. We needed to rebook. They had kindly rebooked for us, on the same airline, China Southern, but now the flight was at 8 p.m. We could change our booking to another airline, but we thought why bother, all the flights available were in the evening. This was a huge problem in the end, but I’ll get to this later. Lilly, our guide for a couple of days in this area finally returned my e-mail and said we’d still go to the terraces this evening. Cancel our hotel booking in Guilin.
Since we had a lot more time in Hong Kong today than I had originally planned we took advantage of it. Hopping onto the double decker tram, which ran right down Yee Wo Street near our hotel, we grabbed seats on the top floor.
Today we planned on visiting the Western side of Hong Kong Island. This turned out to be my favorite place in Hong Kong. The tram rides down Des Voeux Rd. and straight to the Western Market, which is past Central. Unfortunately the Western Market wasn’t open yet, (opens at 10a.m.) so instead we found the Sheung Wan Cooked Food Center across the road, opens at 6 a.m. This building has several floors, 3 I believe, of very busy food stalls in full swing. Live chickens, ready to be selected and killed, horse, goat, fish, frogs, geese, noodles, eggs, vegetables, bugs. Anything you can imagine eating, it’s here. If you love busy markets, don’t miss this one, it was fabulous!
Following a walk I printed out from Frommer’s http://www.frommers.com/destinations...078020034.html, we found the snake shop at 13 Hillier St. 4 men were removing gallbladders from piles of snakes and then threw the snakes into baskets. They didn’t want me to take a photo, so I didn’t. It was
fascinating watching them, but I hate snakes. This whole area is so interesting. Wander the streets here, Wing Lok St., Bonham Strand, and you’ll see dozens of shops selling all manners of food items, many I didn’t recognize, along with dried fish, flattened fish, starfish, & sea slugs. Other streets are full of herbal medical shops, selling dried fish bladders, snake gall bladders, roots, twigs, insects, and more items. I have no idea what they all were.
This seemed like the real Hong Kong of the past. There were a couple of large funeral shops also, where I bought a nice red lantern. If you want a long paper dragon, this is the place to buy it. The China Bird’s Nest shop is also in this area, along with old time barber shops, sharks fins shops and more. On Man Wa Lane I looked for Chop stalls, but couldn’t find any. Are they still in this area?
From this part of town it’s easy to walk to Hollywood Road. We weren’t very interested in the antique shops, but loved seeing the Man Mo Temple and the huge incense spirals burning from the ceiling. I took several good photos of this and they didn’t seem to care. Most temples don’t want you to take photos. Ladder street is almost next to the temple, walk up it, find the mid levels escalators, ride them, and on Pedder Street I believe there are several button and lace stalls. Other streets we enjoyed were Li Yuen St. West and East and the SoHo area around Gage. It’s all such fun to explore.
Needing to eat lunch we just went back to Tsim Chai Kee on Wellington Street for a bowl of their delicious noodles. Soon we were to get very tired of eating so many noodles though!
I felt that we needed to see a bit more of Kowloon that we missed yesterday. Walking past a Citi Bank demonstration, we returned to the MTR and took it to Jordan. We walked around Reclamation St., Temple St. visited the Jade Markets, and walked down Nathan St. It was so, so hot. We saw another temple, with lots of incense burning again. We hated this area. It was miserable after being in the Western Market area of Hong Kong. It just confirmed our selection of staying on the other side.
Needing some rest and air conditioning, we returned to JIA hotel for some apple cake! Each afternoon around 3 p.m. they put a cake out. Soft drinks and water are available in the lobby refrigerator for no charge. They do such a good job providing some extras! We collected our luggage awhile later and they helped us bring it outside to the street. My husband just wanted to take our luggage and be on our way. He got flustered, finally taking it, and stepped into the street, barely avoided getting hit by a taxi driver. It was such a close call, everyone around us were dazed. For the rest of the trip we kept referring to how lucky we were that he hadn’t been killed, right there in the streets of Hong Kong.
We were taking the MTR from Causeway Bay to Elements Mall which is above the MTR Kowloon Station, Exit C, in order to take the China Link bus to Shenzhen airport in China. You must transfer from Central MTR to Hong Kong MTR station. This is easy since there is a long corridor connecting the two stations. We traveled with just 2 21” suitcases and one extra small bag, so the walk was no problem for us. When arriving at Kowloon Station, up an escalator is a desk where you turn in your Octopus Card and receive your refund. The China Link Bus office is on the lst floor of the mall, very close to where the escalator arrives. Just walk straight ahead from the escalator and you’ll see the office on the left, across from Starbucks. http://www.chinalink.hk/co_service_routes16.html Bus departure times: 6:15 – 19:15 daily; two buses departing hourly; at :15 and at :45 (6:15, 6:45; 7:15, 7:45; 8:15, 8:45; 9:15, 9:45, etc)
The trip is HK100.
When you arrive they’ll take your passports, look up your flight information, ask your seat preference, i.e. window, isle, and give you your boarding passes for your flight right here in this office. You’ll be assigned a time for departure when there are seats available. They give you a sticker to wear. Wear it, since you need this to be collected after the border crossing. We only waited a few minutes. Then you simply take an escalator down from this waiting area to the basement where the buses are located. Ignore the signs that tell you what time the bus leaves. We were directed to a bus whose time of departure didn’t match up with the sign above it! The drive to Shenzhen airport takes around 90 min. through the Shenzhen Hong Kong West Corridor, with Hong Kong/mainland China checkpoints under one roof. It took about 50 min. to reach the border. Once you arrive at the border, you must collect your luggage from the bus and enter the immigration building. It’s very convenient but the foreigners have a different line to cross the border. Because of the swine flu scare, this line was very slow. We had to fill out extra paperwork and have our temperatures taken with a gun like devise pointed at our foreheads. Thankfully we passed! By the time we were finished with the clearance process, our bus had left with the Chinese nationals on board. China Link was so very organized. They had an extra bus waiting for the 5 of us, boarded us, and we were off, driving to the airport. What service! This whole process actually took us 1 hr. 45 minutes since the border crossing took longer for us.
The ATM machines accepted our CC fine and we took out Chinese currency, putting away our extra HKD’s. We checked into our flight early, no problem and checked our luggage. Luggage service in China’s airports was excellent. After our flights our luggage always appeared very quickly. No problem with this at all. You must check your luggage, it can’t be carried on.
After an early dinner at the airport restaurant, which also had Wifi, we went to our gate. Now the problems would begin.
May 11
Today we’re going to fly from Shenzhen to Guilin. These flights cost much less than flights from Hong Kong to Guilin. When I booked our flight, not long ago, there was a morning flight which was perfect since we were traveling to Ping’an in the Longji rice terraces tonight. One day before we left the U.S. for Hong Kong we received an email from 9588, the ticketing service we used, stating that the flight we booked had just been canceled. There were no other morning flights. We needed to rebook. They had kindly rebooked for us, on the same airline, China Southern, but now the flight was at 8 p.m. We could change our booking to another airline, but we thought why bother, all the flights available were in the evening. This was a huge problem in the end, but I’ll get to this later. Lilly, our guide for a couple of days in this area finally returned my e-mail and said we’d still go to the terraces this evening. Cancel our hotel booking in Guilin.
Since we had a lot more time in Hong Kong today than I had originally planned we took advantage of it. Hopping onto the double decker tram, which ran right down Yee Wo Street near our hotel, we grabbed seats on the top floor.
Today we planned on visiting the Western side of Hong Kong Island. This turned out to be my favorite place in Hong Kong. The tram rides down Des Voeux Rd. and straight to the Western Market, which is past Central. Unfortunately the Western Market wasn’t open yet, (opens at 10a.m.) so instead we found the Sheung Wan Cooked Food Center across the road, opens at 6 a.m. This building has several floors, 3 I believe, of very busy food stalls in full swing. Live chickens, ready to be selected and killed, horse, goat, fish, frogs, geese, noodles, eggs, vegetables, bugs. Anything you can imagine eating, it’s here. If you love busy markets, don’t miss this one, it was fabulous!
Following a walk I printed out from Frommer’s http://www.frommers.com/destinations...078020034.html, we found the snake shop at 13 Hillier St. 4 men were removing gallbladders from piles of snakes and then threw the snakes into baskets. They didn’t want me to take a photo, so I didn’t. It was
fascinating watching them, but I hate snakes. This whole area is so interesting. Wander the streets here, Wing Lok St., Bonham Strand, and you’ll see dozens of shops selling all manners of food items, many I didn’t recognize, along with dried fish, flattened fish, starfish, & sea slugs. Other streets are full of herbal medical shops, selling dried fish bladders, snake gall bladders, roots, twigs, insects, and more items. I have no idea what they all were.
This seemed like the real Hong Kong of the past. There were a couple of large funeral shops also, where I bought a nice red lantern. If you want a long paper dragon, this is the place to buy it. The China Bird’s Nest shop is also in this area, along with old time barber shops, sharks fins shops and more. On Man Wa Lane I looked for Chop stalls, but couldn’t find any. Are they still in this area?
From this part of town it’s easy to walk to Hollywood Road. We weren’t very interested in the antique shops, but loved seeing the Man Mo Temple and the huge incense spirals burning from the ceiling. I took several good photos of this and they didn’t seem to care. Most temples don’t want you to take photos. Ladder street is almost next to the temple, walk up it, find the mid levels escalators, ride them, and on Pedder Street I believe there are several button and lace stalls. Other streets we enjoyed were Li Yuen St. West and East and the SoHo area around Gage. It’s all such fun to explore.
Needing to eat lunch we just went back to Tsim Chai Kee on Wellington Street for a bowl of their delicious noodles. Soon we were to get very tired of eating so many noodles though!
I felt that we needed to see a bit more of Kowloon that we missed yesterday. Walking past a Citi Bank demonstration, we returned to the MTR and took it to Jordan. We walked around Reclamation St., Temple St. visited the Jade Markets, and walked down Nathan St. It was so, so hot. We saw another temple, with lots of incense burning again. We hated this area. It was miserable after being in the Western Market area of Hong Kong. It just confirmed our selection of staying on the other side.
Needing some rest and air conditioning, we returned to JIA hotel for some apple cake! Each afternoon around 3 p.m. they put a cake out. Soft drinks and water are available in the lobby refrigerator for no charge. They do such a good job providing some extras! We collected our luggage awhile later and they helped us bring it outside to the street. My husband just wanted to take our luggage and be on our way. He got flustered, finally taking it, and stepped into the street, barely avoided getting hit by a taxi driver. It was such a close call, everyone around us were dazed. For the rest of the trip we kept referring to how lucky we were that he hadn’t been killed, right there in the streets of Hong Kong.
We were taking the MTR from Causeway Bay to Elements Mall which is above the MTR Kowloon Station, Exit C, in order to take the China Link bus to Shenzhen airport in China. You must transfer from Central MTR to Hong Kong MTR station. This is easy since there is a long corridor connecting the two stations. We traveled with just 2 21” suitcases and one extra small bag, so the walk was no problem for us. When arriving at Kowloon Station, up an escalator is a desk where you turn in your Octopus Card and receive your refund. The China Link Bus office is on the lst floor of the mall, very close to where the escalator arrives. Just walk straight ahead from the escalator and you’ll see the office on the left, across from Starbucks. http://www.chinalink.hk/co_service_routes16.html Bus departure times: 6:15 – 19:15 daily; two buses departing hourly; at :15 and at :45 (6:15, 6:45; 7:15, 7:45; 8:15, 8:45; 9:15, 9:45, etc)
The trip is HK100.
When you arrive they’ll take your passports, look up your flight information, ask your seat preference, i.e. window, isle, and give you your boarding passes for your flight right here in this office. You’ll be assigned a time for departure when there are seats available. They give you a sticker to wear. Wear it, since you need this to be collected after the border crossing. We only waited a few minutes. Then you simply take an escalator down from this waiting area to the basement where the buses are located. Ignore the signs that tell you what time the bus leaves. We were directed to a bus whose time of departure didn’t match up with the sign above it! The drive to Shenzhen airport takes around 90 min. through the Shenzhen Hong Kong West Corridor, with Hong Kong/mainland China checkpoints under one roof. It took about 50 min. to reach the border. Once you arrive at the border, you must collect your luggage from the bus and enter the immigration building. It’s very convenient but the foreigners have a different line to cross the border. Because of the swine flu scare, this line was very slow. We had to fill out extra paperwork and have our temperatures taken with a gun like devise pointed at our foreheads. Thankfully we passed! By the time we were finished with the clearance process, our bus had left with the Chinese nationals on board. China Link was so very organized. They had an extra bus waiting for the 5 of us, boarded us, and we were off, driving to the airport. What service! This whole process actually took us 1 hr. 45 minutes since the border crossing took longer for us.
The ATM machines accepted our CC fine and we took out Chinese currency, putting away our extra HKD’s. We checked into our flight early, no problem and checked our luggage. Luggage service in China’s airports was excellent. After our flights our luggage always appeared very quickly. No problem with this at all. You must check your luggage, it can’t be carried on.
After an early dinner at the airport restaurant, which also had Wifi, we went to our gate. Now the problems would begin.
Jun 3rd, 2009, 10:19 AM
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When there are problems with flights in China, and you don’t know Mandarin, you have no hope of figuring out what the problem is as no one at all speaks English. Well, someone must somewhere, because a white board eventually appears with a message that the flight is delayed, not much else. Remember, this flight was originally scheduled to leave in the morning. China Southern cancelled that and added this 8 p.m. flight. Probably most of the passengers had been planning on taking the morning flight originally. Well, while waiting at the gate, all of a sudden we heard a huge commotion. Several passengers started yelling at the two gate agents. The China Southern employees were yelling back at the passengers. More passengers joined in. It got louder and louder. This went on for at least 30 minutes. We knew it wasn’t good. Eventually we caught sight of 4 Westerns who decided to leave the gate area, walking back into the main terminal area. I jumped up and asked them if they had any idea what was going on. Two of them knew Mandarin!!!! Our flight was being delayed for at least one hour, most likely longer. We didn’t have a new time of departure. They were going to go find food. We had to wait.
Lilly Lu was waiting for us in Guilin. I had arranged for her to be our guide for a couple of days in this area. We needed a driver to Ping’an and a guide to bike with us through the countryside. We agreed to a 4 day plan here. Lilly’s email is [email protected] She is a good guide when she wants to be, but when she doesn’t, you need to hold your ground firmly to what you’ve agreed with her in advance. More on that later.
We hoped Lilly was receiving this information about our delay while at Guilin’s airport. We couldn’t use SKYPE to call her because there was no Wifi in this terminal. Lilly did try and call us, but didn’t dial the country code, since she can’t call outside of China, so we never connected.
The toilets in this airport were pit toilets. I finally found one toilet marked that it was for the “weak”. My foot was hurting so much. I decided I was weak! Hum, I didn’t realize until reading my notes that my foot hurt so much, so early in this trip. It was a big problem for me, but I had to push through the pain since this is probably my only trip ever to China. Now that I’m home I’ve decided my foot probably has a stress fracture. It’s no better. Tomorrow I go to the doctor’s about it.
Well, 1 hr. 20 min. delay occurred, we boarded, very worried about the late hour and our trip to Ping’an. We landed in Guilin around 10:15 or 10:30p.m. Lilly and her driver were waiting for us. She wasn’t sure if we’d even arrive, although we were in email contact just 3 days earlier. She said we were still going to drive to Ping’an even though it was so late. We trusted she knew what she was doing. Once we were on our way we learned that they had never undertaken this drive so late at night. The driver was concerned about fog.
Well, it was terrifying. The whole drive was a dangerous situation that never should have happened. The roads are winding , going higher and higher, the fog got thicker and thicker. Driver couldn’t see. We crept along. There was a fair amount of traffic, trucks mostly coming towards us. Our driver drank Red Bull and rolled down the window. I knew we were going to die, driving off the side of the mountain. The paved road turned off onto a dirt road. Oh, I was praying so hard that we’d make it safely. This was taking 3 hours. Lilly admitted she was scared also. Thankfully, somewhere on this dirt road, the fog lifted. If it hadn’t we would have never made it. By the time we reached the Longji rice terraces entrance and parked, it was so late that at least the admission ticket offices were closed up for the night.
We didn’t need to pay the 50rmb entrance fee per person. We left our suitcases in the trunk of the car, and just brought a change of clothes and toiletries with us. We still needed to hike up the hill 20 minutes in the dark. Thankfully I had packed 2 flashlights and had them with us. We could see none of the beautiful scenery around us. Once we arrived at the Countryside Inn, where we had a reservation, ha, ha, we knocked on the door. Lilly had called ahead and informed them we were still arriving at this late hour. They were shocked. It took awhile for a girl to answer our knocking since she had fallen asleep! Finally we were in our room. It’s a very nice place to stay. The room is totally paneled in light wood, has a western bathroom, and very comfortable beds. There is a TV in each room, unfortunately, because a French woman left hers on all night. They also have a café here where we had a good breakfast for an extra charge. A small grocery store is nearby.
Countryside Hotel Lu Lu email : [email protected]-tele 0086-773-7583596 or 7583020 Ping’an Village, LongSheng, China #1 Longji Rice Terrace
The next morning everything would improve wonderfully!
Lilly Lu was waiting for us in Guilin. I had arranged for her to be our guide for a couple of days in this area. We needed a driver to Ping’an and a guide to bike with us through the countryside. We agreed to a 4 day plan here. Lilly’s email is [email protected] She is a good guide when she wants to be, but when she doesn’t, you need to hold your ground firmly to what you’ve agreed with her in advance. More on that later.
We hoped Lilly was receiving this information about our delay while at Guilin’s airport. We couldn’t use SKYPE to call her because there was no Wifi in this terminal. Lilly did try and call us, but didn’t dial the country code, since she can’t call outside of China, so we never connected.
The toilets in this airport were pit toilets. I finally found one toilet marked that it was for the “weak”. My foot was hurting so much. I decided I was weak! Hum, I didn’t realize until reading my notes that my foot hurt so much, so early in this trip. It was a big problem for me, but I had to push through the pain since this is probably my only trip ever to China. Now that I’m home I’ve decided my foot probably has a stress fracture. It’s no better. Tomorrow I go to the doctor’s about it.
Well, 1 hr. 20 min. delay occurred, we boarded, very worried about the late hour and our trip to Ping’an. We landed in Guilin around 10:15 or 10:30p.m. Lilly and her driver were waiting for us. She wasn’t sure if we’d even arrive, although we were in email contact just 3 days earlier. She said we were still going to drive to Ping’an even though it was so late. We trusted she knew what she was doing. Once we were on our way we learned that they had never undertaken this drive so late at night. The driver was concerned about fog.
Well, it was terrifying. The whole drive was a dangerous situation that never should have happened. The roads are winding , going higher and higher, the fog got thicker and thicker. Driver couldn’t see. We crept along. There was a fair amount of traffic, trucks mostly coming towards us. Our driver drank Red Bull and rolled down the window. I knew we were going to die, driving off the side of the mountain. The paved road turned off onto a dirt road. Oh, I was praying so hard that we’d make it safely. This was taking 3 hours. Lilly admitted she was scared also. Thankfully, somewhere on this dirt road, the fog lifted. If it hadn’t we would have never made it. By the time we reached the Longji rice terraces entrance and parked, it was so late that at least the admission ticket offices were closed up for the night.
We didn’t need to pay the 50rmb entrance fee per person. We left our suitcases in the trunk of the car, and just brought a change of clothes and toiletries with us. We still needed to hike up the hill 20 minutes in the dark. Thankfully I had packed 2 flashlights and had them with us. We could see none of the beautiful scenery around us. Once we arrived at the Countryside Inn, where we had a reservation, ha, ha, we knocked on the door. Lilly had called ahead and informed them we were still arriving at this late hour. They were shocked. It took awhile for a girl to answer our knocking since she had fallen asleep! Finally we were in our room. It’s a very nice place to stay. The room is totally paneled in light wood, has a western bathroom, and very comfortable beds. There is a TV in each room, unfortunately, because a French woman left hers on all night. They also have a café here where we had a good breakfast for an extra charge. A small grocery store is nearby.Countryside Hotel Lu Lu email : [email protected]-tele 0086-773-7583596 or 7583020 Ping’an Village, LongSheng, China #1 Longji Rice Terrace
The next morning everything would improve wonderfully!
Jun 3rd, 2009, 02:56 PM
#18
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Once the drive was over, we put it out of our minds. Ping'an is so awesome I'd probably do the drive again if it was the only way to get there For others, just make sure you drive up during the daylight!
Nothing was going to stop us! My foot just had to take the abuse everyday. Mornings were OK, afternoons difficult. The hike up the Great Wall was fine for my foot. I guess it's because with all the steps your feet don't flex. It was really surprising.
Our 12 yr. old grandson had a cast put on his whole leg yesterday due to a "cavity" in his knee. Guess if he can take that for the next 6 weeks, I can take whatever the doctor does to this foot tomorrow.
For others, just make sure you drive up during the daylight!Nothing was going to stop us! My foot just had to take the abuse everyday. Mornings were OK, afternoons difficult. The hike up the Great Wall was fine for my foot. I guess it's because with all the steps your feet don't flex. It was really surprising.
Our 12 yr. old grandson had a cast put on his whole leg yesterday due to a "cavity" in his knee. Guess if he can take that for the next 6 weeks, I can take whatever the doctor does to this foot tomorrow.
Jun 3rd, 2009, 10:08 PM
#20
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Enjoying your report, as we did everything you did in reverse order; even used the same guide in Yangshuo ! Enjoyed reading about your adventurous ride up to Ping'an. Must have been scary then, although I bet feels great to think about it now !
