3/4/12 Hong Kong

John and I decided to make the most of our trip and site see in Hong Kong on day 1.  It's not often that you get to travel to a foreign city so who wants to sit in the hotel all day.  Our travel agency recommended that we use the Airport Express Train to go to the city, and it was a GREAT recommendation.  Straight forward directions, continual rotation of trains, fast commute...  Once we got to the station, we had no idea where to go.  I really wanted to go to the Peak Tram that goes up to Victoria Peak, but it was so foggy that you couldn't see the Peak to be able to walk by site to the tram station.  We used a taxi to go the short ride.  When we go there, we were hit up by a vendor recommending a Big City Bus Tour.  At first, we were going to blow him off, but after listening to him, we liked what we heard.  The fair included 4 different routes, 2 Star Ferry passings, and the Peak Tram.  He also recommended that we start on the bus and come back in the afternoon for the tram since it was so foggy.  His recommendation agreed w/ what I had read in the travel guides.  We'd be able to go up, but we'd only see clouds once we were there. 

So, we set out to see the city via the upper deck of an open aired bus.  It was a great choice.  The audio kept us informed of what we were seeing.  I was able to get good pictures, and we were able to get a better feel for the downtown Central district so that when we did get off the bus, we were able to make our way back to the train station on foot. 

Hong Kong, along with other cities in China, is quite a mix of old and new.  You'll see a large modern sky scraper next to a smaller, run down apartment building.  You have a beautiful harbor with cruise ships docking yet there's container unloading and land reclaimation equipment everywhere which truly impairs the wonderful views that could be there. 

We learned about the common weekend practice of people gathering for picnics which helped to explain why there were so many people just sitting and hanging out on blankets on the sidewalks.  The bus tour stumbled beside a parade / festival.  The participants were just as interested in us as we were of them.  Joint picture taking was going on.  John thinks it was an Insect Festival that he had read about, but we're not 100% sure.  We saw the tallest building in Hong Kong, but I wasn't able to get my camera pointed up in time.  I did get a couple of pictures of other tall buildings that were built around it though.  Unfortunately, I didn't get my tram ride in.  :(  By the time we did all of our bus touring and lunch, we were out of time and had to get back to the hotel and airport.  Catching the plane out was much more important that seeing the peak.