Victoria Peak & Star Ferry Harbour Tour.

Yesterday was impressive, we were planning on visit the Giant Buddha, but that ended up changing due to my mum's legs being too bad and by that time it being too late in the day once we'd had dim sum. So we dashed our plans and headed to another 'must see' tourist sight in Hong Kong, Victoria Peak ('The Peak').

The view from up there is pretty awesome, it boasts to be the largest viewing platform in Hong Kong, you can see everything, we could even guess where the apartment was!
We got sucked into getting a bundle including Madame Tussauds, which actually turned out to be okay. I quite liked The Peak venue as well, it's got quite a few junky/tourist tat shops that I love (despite them stupidly disallowing photographs), and we were also conveniently able to buy our Disney tickets for tomorrow there - I had to pay with my card so that's probably a dud now due to being slightly out of the ordinary, I hope it's ok, but I won't know until I'm able to access my voicemails when I get back...
We had lunch at Bubba Gump, which was heinously over-priced but otherwise nothing I'd complain about, maybe if they didn't provide so much food, their prices wouldn't have to be so high, the view was pretty damn sweet though.












After going back to the apartment to relax for a couple of hours, we finally did the activity that I've been yammering on about for the last week, a Star Ferry Harbour Tour during 'A Symphony of Lights'! Apparently we should have taken a 'junk ferry', but in my view it was just as good and we missed getting charged extra because the lights begin at 8pm and the boat doesn't depart until 5 past, but we saw everything anyway.
The display didn't disappoint and it was cool to listen to the music from the boat, it was a bit cheesy and 'typically Chinese', but it was so beautiful. People were pretty eager for chairs but we managed to find some in the end. A bonus of the trip was the free fizzy pop and honey cake that was bundled in with the price, I was quite pleased. I'm glad I did it and it was very much worth the wait.








As I mentioned, we're heading to Disneyland tomorrow, our family here - and I do to an extent - think we're mad because we've already been to Florida so many times as well as Paris, but, and I don't care about the repercussions, I love Disney, and that's it, it makes me happy, the rides, the atmosphere, it's lovely. I felt that it was pretty reasonably priced too compared to UK theme park prices. I've heard that it's apparently really small, but that doesn't take away from anything, I'm so excited!
Flickr set.

Tsim Sha Tsui & Sai Kung.

Yesterday we were out from 11am to 12am, so like I mentioned in my previous post it was a long day. However, due to all the excitement of, you know, getting home, no one went to bed until 2am... and I couldn't sleep until at least 4am, I only woke up an hour ago. Perhaps I am slightly ashamed but the last few days have been knackering and it's not something that I plan on doing from here on in.
My sleeping pattern so farhas been awful, going to bed at 2-3am and waking up at 9, I hit a wall at about 3pm but don't embrace it and power through, I think that was the key to it, so maybe this slight mistake will make everything a bit better.

We began yesterday with a buffet lunch at The Royal Garden restaurant in Tsim Sha Tsui, it's part of a large hotel that has a few other restaurants in it too, it was pretty posh. They had so much choice in food, from sashimi to salad and to hot curry dishes and dim sum. It was a weird mixture, but it worked because you could choose from anything, I don't think there's anywhere similar, that is as good in the UK. The had some pretty awesome puddings too - I had chocolate fountain, American cheesecake, a chocolate mousse and a pandan pancake, you know, I haven't really had any sweets in a while and it was all paid for, so...






After The Royal Garden we went to the Hong Kong Museum of History, I was surprisingly underwhelmed. I usually really go for museums and enjoy them, but there was something about this place. Maybe it was because it was too fact-heavy, I knew nearly everything and what I didn't know, I wasn't interested in. I think what the main problem was my sister taking about 10 years to look at everything, she examined every detail of each plaque and we were there for nearly 3 hours, which would have been fine if I had been enjoying it, but I just ended up bored and frustrated. I think the slow pace meant that even the parts of Hong Kong history that I am interested in had the enthusiasm sucked out of it. It's quite a patriotic place too, which I thought was a bit strange for a museum, I don't mean it in a bad way, it's just something I've never really experienced before.







We then did a bit of shopping around Mong Kok, and I picked up a neat underwater 35mm camera, which I look forward to using on the beach in France at the end of August. I hope it works as it's much cheaper than buying disposable underwater cameras and I already have the film, it might be alright. Then we went to the Tsim Sha Tsui ladies market, which was fun until I got tricked into haggling for a bag I didn't even want, it's a nice bag, I just don't feel much of an affinity for it. We all hopped on the bus once we found each other (my sister and I got separated from my mum and cousins) and we headed over to Sai Kung, a small fishing town on the other side of Kowloon. I couldn't see much because it was very dark by then but we went to a restaurant that was right on the harbour which had fishtanks full of fresh seafood to pick from for dinner. I've never seen anything like that before. The supermarkets here and Oriental supermarkets in the UK as well as some restaurants do allow you to pick live seafood, I suppose, but nowhere near on this scale or with this much choice! The restaurants even allowed you to hold some of their produce, my Mum took one for the team and held up a huge lobster, bigger than any I've ever seen. The meal was great but the journey back was a bit of a pain because it was so far away from where we were and it was very late.









Yesterday was easily my favourite day so far, just because there was less travelling and more taking the time to do things, even though it was busy, it was still enjoyable. I loved taking so many pictures and having so many fun things to take picture of, this does however exclude the museum, but that's just me, I think everyone I was with loved it.
Ongoing Flickr set

Hello from HK.

I thought that I should finish the day with a quick post to let you know what I've been up to, otherwise I think that I would start to get behind, I took so may photos to day anyway!

Even more walking has taken place and my legs are basically killing me, but the good news is that I may finally be used to the weather. However, saying that, it has been much cooler in the last two days due to the threat of small typhoons. I experienced my first one yesterday, it lasted about five minutes, but it was some pretty intense, heavy rain. I'm glad for it anyway though because it equates to this slightly cooler (but still boiling) weather.
I still haven't managed to see 'A Symphony of Lights', but I'm only five days into a two and a half week holiday, so I'm not crying about it. Nearly everyone we have told about it gets cross because you can watch the show for free along the Tsim Sha Tsui promenade, but that's not at all like a boat is it?

It's actually quite good to keep the blog going while I'm away, because, despite the short amount of time, I'm already losing track of days and it feels like I've been here forever. I think this problem may be related to the heat and the slow pace at which I'm then forced to do everything. It's not as though I am complaining because our days have been very packed, although I am glad for the 'day off' tomorrow.

I'm hoping that we can visit more of the New Territory next week because things seem to be cheaper there, and I'm not really much of a one for designer clothes and brands; although I may be tempted to treat myself to something before I leave.

So, despite the last couple of days being a bit of a blur, I can tell you that the weather hasn't been brilliant and we have been very touristy. On Thursday we did a bit of shopping and hung out in Tai Koo Mall, and on Friday we visited some traditional Hong Kong monasteries. Due to the fact that Hong Kong is part of such a large spiritual heritage by default, I was surprised to hear my BBC cousin, who now lives here, talk about the lack of 'culture' in Hong Kong. We visited both the Wong Tai Sin Temple and the Chi Lin Nunnery, they were a bit of fresh air from the bombardment of over-saturated shopping complexes, but I enjoy both in different ways.
Today was a very busy, not to mention long, day, so I will more than likely update tomorrow on the planned day off, although my Mum is slightly threatening that we might leave Causeway Bay, I might protest and be a bad holiday-maker. I've had more activity in the last five days than I have had in five months. I thought holidays were about rest, but in somewhere as bustling as Hong Kong it was probably always going to be out of the question, at least I'm experiencing new things and taking it all in.

Nearly every shopping complex we have visited has had this kind of stage area, I'm unsure of what was happening, but we have passed several performances now. This photo was at the mall in Tai Koo and seemed to be related to Guiness World Records...

I felt remorse over the lack of arms in this sign.

My sister and I got our fortunes told when we visited the temple in Wong Tai Sin, get your diaries out, apparently I'm getting married in 2013, it's good that I was wearing all my lucky colours too.

Ongoing Flickr set
Lookout for another post tomorrow. It's so odd with the time difference here, my sleeping pattern is more than ruined, despite probably being jet-lag free now.