I don’t know whether we arrived a day early or left a day late but on the day we turned up we were docked in the commercial dock area of the city – at Kwai Chung Container Terminal III by my reckoning of landmarks – which meant our first view of Hong Kong was somewhat industrial. Cranes and containers surrounded us and only the more distant sights were of the skyscrapers we’d been expecting to see. Still, the weather was gorgeous and there’s a type of beauty even in these commercial ports, especially when you’re on the other side of the world and experiencing them for the first time. I suspect that’s a minority view but it suits my contrarian nature.

The video below was shot from the top deck of Diamond Princess looking first eastwards then crossing over and looking westwards to show the views from this part of Hong Kong. What’s of slight interest (very slight; like so slight you might not even spot there’s any interest at all; we’re talking a sliver of slightness that practically disappears if you look at it edge on) is that you’ll be able to see that the Stonecutters Bridge wasn’t quite complete when we visited; there’s a gap in the centre of the award-winning bridge’s span over the Rambler Channel.

We’d booked a Hong Kong Island highlights excursion for our day in the city so it was just a case of waiting until we were due to head off – that usual gathering in the theatre with your tickets and assigned tour group number while watching people try to sit at the ends of the rows, causing chaos, or leaving before their row is due, out of some utter desperation to get on the bus first and mark them out to their fellow passengers as selfish tits – then trundling off the ship and to our designated means of transportation.

Victoria Peak

Our bus took us from the Hong Kong mainland onto the island and dropped us off at the station ready for a funicular train ride to the viewing platforms on Victoria Peak. It was incredibly crowded and quite chaotic waiting to board and I’m not convinced that everyone in our tour group managed to get onto the same train going up, but I’m sure we all made it eventually because there was no panicked stare in the ship’s representative’s eyes when taking head-counts during the remainder of the excursion’s activities.

A sculpture of local legend Jackie Chan caught our eye and it wouldn’t be the only time he would appear in some form on our two days in Hong Kong, with our tour guide pointing out his house as we drove past it later in the day, and with us seeing his star on the walk of fame the day after.

 The view from Victoria Peak was the classic one that everyone knows from looking for pictures of Hong Kong online, even if the haze from heat or pollution made the skyline photography a lot less than ideal. Some skyscraper landmarks we had pointed out to us included the Bank of China Tower (designed by renowned architect I.M. Pei) and Central Plaza, but you can also see in the photos and video from Victoria Peak below that there was a building under construction across the water, on the mainland, and that was the International Commerce Centre, the tallest building in Hong Kong.

Stanley Market

The next stop on our Hong Kong excursion was to the southern side of the island and a shopping trip at Stanley Market. We were assured that this was a great place to get good quality, cheap souvenirs and clothing, and that actually turned out to be true. We’re not shoppers when we travel but we did have some local currency on us – we like to spend when we’re ashore, helping the local economy in some small way, and we’ll judge you if you don’t do the same – so ducked into a side alley and were encouraged into a shop selling silk shirts by the owner there. He looked me up and down then reached back into a pile of shirts and pulled out a short-sleeved, dark blue, silk number, threw it into a bag, and asked for a very reasonable sum of money. We took a chance on not being handed something polyester, nine sizes too small, and I’m glad we did. It fit me like a glove, it felt divine, and I still have it now, even if it’s a little snugger around the waist these days.

Aberdeen

Our penultimate stop on this guided tour was Aberdeen, named for the 4th Earl of Aberdeen and former mid-nineteenth century Prime Minister, George Hamilton-Gordon. The original name of Aberdeen was actually Hong Kong but foreigners mistook it for the whole island and by the time this was realised the misunderstanding had stuck. The locals now call Aberdeen Hong Kong Tsai which can be translated as Son of Hong Kong.

Aberdeen is famous for its floating village and restaurants and it was to a famous one of the latter that we had a quick bite for lunch. The floating village houses many boats and is home to the Tanka people, historically associated with fishing in Hong Kong harbour and with prostitution, though that is partly ethnic stereotyping of people seen as low caste across much of Asia.

Once our short stop for food was complete we then boarded boats for a ride around the Aberdeen waterfront.

The final stop was to see some artistic workmanship in a jeweller’s workshop. As always with these kinds of stops on these cruise ship-organised excursions there’s a push to buy merchandise too, and while we didn’t there were some in our tour group who did, which was good to see. It always helps when you’ve got plenty of wealthy Americans in your group.

Even though Diamond Princess would be in Hong Kong for another day, everyone had to be back on board by early evening as the cruise ship needed to move to an anchoring spot in Junk Bay. The timing of the ship’s repositioning to its new location in Hong Kong Harbour would mean we’d get to watch the famous Hong Kong Harbour Light Show from the water.

You don’t fly half way around the world to then skip out on a nighttime exploration of Hong Kong in favour of on board entertainment so we had some food early then headed down to the tender boats. A large group of people were waiting which was what we’d expected but they suddenly turned and parted as one to let us through; it turned out that everyone there was a member of the crew and passengers had priority. It also turned out that hardly any passengers from the ship got off at all. So much for not passing up the opportunity to explore Hong Kong.

Hong Kong Night Adventure

We took the boat across to Hong Kong Island, then jumped on a ferry to head across to the mainland where, after a bit of a wander around, we headed to the Temple Street night market. It was here that I was looking to get a new lens for my camera. At the time I wasn’t that experienced with photography and all I had was a kit lens on a Canon 350D. We entered an open-fronted store and sat down with a group of Chinese men who initially laughed at my lens, told me not to get the EF-S wide angle lens I was after, then recommended a wide angle EF-mount by Tokina instead as it would be compatible with a better camera body if I upgraded. To be honest we were starting to feel intimidated but the lens was tested and worked nicely and the price was right so we bought it and left. Outside, we had planned to walk through the market a bit more but my wife suddenly became aware that one of the men from the shop was behind us. Because he’d seen where I was keeping my wallet me wife placed herself in the way and mentioned it to me; we became worried and decided to “throw off our tail” by turning left three times. This worked – probably because there was a totally innocent explanation and the guy was simply heading the same way as us – but we decided we’d had enough and wanted to get back to the cruise ship.

We headed down to where the Hong Kong ferry had dropped us off… only to discover they stopped running after midnight. Nobody had mentioned that to us. We needed to get back to the tender boats on the island and were considering having to get a taxi to take us through the tunnel when we bumped into a Dutch family who could obviously see we looked worried. They handed us one of their maps and told us to follow them because there was a last train running shortly. Thus it was that my wife and I ended up running through the streets of Hong Kong in the early hours of the morning, following a Dutch family, heading to the train station. We worked out how to use the ticket machine just in time for the train, boarded, took it to the island, walked down to the tender boat point, then gradually tried to return to a normal temperature as we waited for the boat. Back on board we had to shower and took advantage of room service to get some bourbon, coke, and sandwiches. A stressful night, but an experience I’m glad we had.

Day 2

I started the day by trying out the new lens with pictures of Hong Kong harbour from the ship.

This was my first time using a wide angle lens and I think I couldn’t have had a more lovely day or fascinating place in which to try it out.

My wife and I decided to take the tender boat to the island and the Hong Kong ferry across to the mainland for the second time in not many hours.

We’d elected to explore the place on our own rather than taking up the offer of an organised excursion. We found out that a lot of people had chosen to hit the market but, of course, we’d done that overnight. Instead we headed down to the Hong Kong Space Museum (cheap entry, lots of fun things to examine and even play with; we enjoyed this a lot) and then walked along the Avenue of Stars, which included stars of people we’d heard of – Jet Li, Maggie Cheung, Sammo Hung, Bruce Lee, and Jackie Chan – and a large number of ones we hadn’t.

We didn’t have a huge amount of time in Hong Kong because of our late night adventure and subsequent late (for us) getting up so we wandered around a bit more on foot, enjoying the gloriously clear skies before making our way back to the Diamond Princess in plenty of time for its departure.

The video starts with a few shots from the three-day pre-cruise excursion we took in Beijing where we explored some of the obvious tourist destinations such as The Great Wall and The Forbidden City. The remainder of the video covers each of the port stops in turn interspersed with footage from sea days aboard the cruise ship. For the most part these shots are from the top deck showing off the pools and how they behaved under the rocking and rolling conditions of the South China Sea simply because I didn’t really carry the video camera around with me that much in the inside venues of the ship. On one of the last days at sea on the Diamond Princess we were treated to a fabulous bank of black rainclouds sweeping in from the horizon and sending everyone running for cover. There’s more rain to be seen when we explored Jiufen in Taiwan and it’s one of the places we’ll be returning to on our cruise in a few months’ time; if we get better weather then that will be great but as you can see from the video of that excursion it’s a place that thrives under the atmosphere of a downpour just fine.

Video temporarily removed.

With no trip booked we could afford a leisurely breakfast and a quick nose at the mainland and island areas of Hong Kong from the port side of the ship afterwards. Like that from our balcony this was a dull affair but the humidity that formed those clouds was palpable and the forecast was for the sun to burn off the cover over the city as the day progressed. Anchored off the port side of Diamond Princess was the Starry Metropolis, a 1976-built, 650-passenger capacity entertainment venue for locals looking for dining and entertainment on the water without ever going very far. Its nightclub looks awesome.

We only had a general idea of things we wanted to do in Hong Kong having visited the city for a couple of days ten years earlier and having done the obvious tourist attractions then such as ascending Victoria Peak. We decided that we’d take advantage of the shuttle bus to a Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway (MTR) stop then head towards the south of the mainland to see if anything grabbed our attention and possibly do some jade shopping before ferrying across the harbour to the island for a nose around there too. We had toyed with the idea of heading over to Lantau Island but chose something a little closer as we’re not the most confident users of foreign public transport and we were keen to see if we recognised any of the buildings we’d spotted on our first trip.

We’d been told that there were two shuttle buses running from Kai Tak terminal: one would drop passengers off at Diamond Hill MTR station and one would drop passengers off at Kwun Tong MTR station. The former was more in the direction we wanted to go but as we wandered to the buses we discovered we’d have to wait an hour to go there whereas the shuttle to the latter station would leave in just a few minutes. As both stations were on the same line it didn’t make a huge difference so we opted for the earlier bus.

Public transport everywhere in Hong Kong is very cheap. At Kwun Tong MTR station we admired the easy-to-understand screens and ticket machines and duly picked our destination only to discover that the machines had a minimum spend to use and that due to those low prices we’d need to queue up at a booth and talk to a human instead. The horror! That minor irritation aside, using the MTR was dead simple and the train itself, though crowded, provided a very handy lit-up display indicating current station, direction of travel, and upcoming stations.

We alighted at Yau Ma Tei as a tiny bit of investigation online had shown that this would be closest to some jade shops and my wife was after a piece of white jade in white gold that she couldn’t afford when we’d previously visited on our honeymoon.

It was fabulous to be walking the streets among the tall buildings of Hong Kong. I’m drawn to repetitive patterns in architecture so modern buildings always appeal photographically but there’s something extra joyous about being in a city that’s clearly grown and had sections replaced over the years almost organically so that each of those individual blocks of patterns is often sandwiched between completely different styles and colours; that patchwork quilt of buildings rather than a planned, matching set feels so much more warm and alive and welcoming. Add to that the grime of activity and the stuck-on signs of human life you tend to find in Asian countries such as air conditioning units and drying clothing both dripping onto the streets, the bamboo scaffolding, and the banners exhorting the saleability or rental status of anything and everything and I’m in my element in city locations like this.

So, we’d done a little bit of homework and knew where the jade shops were but if we’d just done a little bit more we’d have realised that most of them wouldn’t open for another hour after we were in the area. We found a few we could browse within but the choices on offer were understandably small and, disappointed and already starting to really feel the claustrophobic heat bearing down from above and reflecting off every surface, we had a small rest in the relatively tranquil Yau Ma Tei Community Centre Rest Garden next to a number of temples in order to check the map and make new semi-plans.

We wanted to hit the southern coast of the mainland where the Star Ferry terminals were which was only one or two MTR stops away depending on which station we might pick to head that way. But, one or two stops sounded a lot like walking distance to us because we weren’t paying attention to map scales well enough and were assuming distances were similar to London Underground distances. They’re not, as you’ve no doubt already surmised. We’d also spotted a large area of greenery about halfway to where we wanted to go which seemed like a sensible landmark to aim for.

This ended up being a lot longer walk than we had expected not just because the blocks were larger than we’d accounted for but also partly because we started zig-zagging through the city in order to seek out shade from the rising sun directly ahead of us for much of the walk.

Kowloon Park

That large area of greenery turned out to be Kowloon Park, a former-British Army barracks demolished in 1970 for the purpose, and the entrance we chose to explore this 33-acre public park was decorated with artwork on the steps leading up to it and the Avenue Of Comic Stars just inside. I won’t pretend to know who any of the comic stars actually were but if this is something you’ve got an interest in then there are plenty of opportunities to pose beside the sometimes-larger-than-life-size sculptures dotted around.

The shade from trees and the cooling effect of the proximity to water called out to us and heading roughly southwest through Kowloon Park we next stumbled upon a lake with sheltered areas on and around it (we happened upon quite a few locals sleeping on the benches, though as something they were just doing to rest rather than from being homeless). More importantly as far as my wife was concerned was the presence of a large number of turtles on logs and in the water; she’s always had a thing for turtles.

Beyond the lake, its pagoda, and surrounding buildings there was an area of Kowloon Park given over to modern art sculptures by different artists in a number of different materials. We spent a pleasant few minutes wandering amongst the stylish forms to see how they appeared from different angles. Some worked better against the trees nearby whilst others were lost a little to the background of skyscrapers in Hong Kong but it was a nice little area in the park.

With a short break to use the public toilets and admire a high-shooting fountain we soon after reached the southern end of the park which contained a couple of mostly-enclosed, lawned areas containing signs warning about fines and arrests for people feeding the pigeons. We saw a woman feeding pigeons there but decided not to photograph her because we are all for little rebellious acts.

In the next post we’ll continue our walk towards Tsim Sha Tsui and the Star Ferry crossing across to Hong Kong Island.

Hong Kong Mainland

From Kowloon Park we aimed due south as that’s where the ferry terminals are. This was an easy route to take as it was heading directly into the sun but this did make the walk one with a lot of squinting and very little photography of the variety of buildings in the city. We were also becoming acutely aware of how long it was taking us to get anywhere on foot in Hong Kong, something we’d not really given enough consideration to when getting off the cruise ship earlier in the day and formulating what could laughingly be called a plan of action.

We were pleased when we finally came upon the fabulous architecture of the Hong Kong Space Museum, itself more-or-less opposite the very famous architectural facade of the Peninsula Hotel. The museum’s design feels very brutalist although the tiled exterior gives it all a more modern, cleaner feel than that architectural movement usually encompasses. On our previous cruise to this part of the world in 2008 we’d actually gone in the museum and had a wonderful time (read more here: Hong Kong) and we briefly considered revisiting it on this trip too but decided to press on in search of new memories.

The nearby Avenue of Stars that we’d hoped to take another walk down was closed for repairs but a sculpture of several characters outside the museum was attracting quite a bit of attention and after a short wait I managed to snap a shot without people hugging parts of of it or posing in front of it.

Star Ferry To Hong Kong Island

This brought us to the Star Ferry pier and the means by which we wanted to get across to the island. There are a number of tunnels if you want to drive or take a taxi to or from the mainland and the MTR trains have lines there too but the best way if you like being on water – and as avid cruisers you can already tell we do – is to take one of the iconic green-and-white ferries. All we could remember of our previous trip to Hong Kong’s experience of using the Star Ferry service was that it was simple to use but the mechanism eluded us. We figured it couldn’t be difficult if we’d done it before when we were complete novices at travelling and, indeed, that was the case. Machines at the terminal accepted cash or cards and dispensed one of two types of token depending on whether we wanted to sit on the lower or upper deck of the ferry. The cost – like all public transport in Hong Kong – was ridiculously cheap (we worked it out at about twenty pence). Getting our lower deck tokens (to afford us some shade as we’re delicate flowers) we passed through a token-accepting barrier to the waiting area and once a ferry arrived and offloaded its passengers another gate opened and we filed onto the boat for a very pleasant, fairly quick skip across the harbour.

Steep Hills On Hong Kong Island

As part of Operation Make It Up As We Go Along we looked at a map briefly enough to select a new target to aim for on the island of Hong Kong. Just as with our mainland mystery tour we found a lump of greenery that attracted our attention, this time being the Hong Kong Zoological And Botanical Gardens. Distance-wise from Central Ferry Pier Number 7, where we’d disembarked the ferry, it looked easily doable but it was here that we made the first of two crucial mistakes when glancing at the map and that was this: we neglected to take into account the elevation.

Give us flat, even ground and we can (and often do) walk for hours, but throw some upness into the equation or some bumpiness along the way and old injuries become aggravated and make things a lot harder for us. We also don’t really cope with high temperatures very well. This never stops us embarking on ridiculously strenuous uphill activities such as that time we hiked up behind a waterfall or that time we hiked along some cliffs or that time we hiked around a volcano but at least we knew we were going to be pushing ourselves and probably regretting it at the time beforehand. Now, you’d think we might have realised that Hong Kong Island was hilly when we’d looked at it from the mainland and you might think we’d have remembered it was hilly based on our previous excursion that had seen us ride the funicular to the top of Victoria Peak but you would be wrong. In our defence the ever-present skyscrapers of the Hong Kong skyline did a good job hiding the climb to come from our eyes.

We passed through the IFC Mall (mostly because it was in the way but also because we realised it would have that most wonderful of things, air conditioning) and started heading southwards in as straight a line as it was possible to do in the general direction of the gardens.

And then we hit the steps. Queen’s Road Central, Stanley Street, and Wellington Street all run parallel to one another on the island but they’re at substantially different heights. Had they just been steps we might have considered a more circuitous route that would have taken us along sloping roads in order to hug the shade where it existed and make the walk a little more interesting but the steps were lined with interesting-looking shops and market stalls and packed with people adding local colour, and it was a simple choice to proceed onwards and upwards.

There weren’t many opportunities to stop and take in the views and there weren’t many places that caught our eye enough as it turned out to take a break inside them on the way up but we had a moment’s respite from the ascent at each of the main road intersections.

Aches and pains and heat put us into that determined frame of mind where all we could focus on was getting to the top of the climb and I barely took any photos of the bits of street art we passed or the edifices that towered over us.

We finally reached slightly more level ground and followed the curve of the road towards the zoological and botanical gardens. This was the second of our two crucial mistakes regarding our attempt to visit this landmark of Hong Kong: we didn’t know where the entrance was. We’d just assumed that by heading towards the big green thing on the map it would be almost impossible not to be able to find a way into it but that wasn’t the case. The gardens were elevated yet again and surrounded by huge walls. Our approach had taken us to the northwestern side of it but there was no indication of where to get in. The only gate we found was locked and we couldn’t see any signs of life on the walls that were still a significant number of metres above our heads. From where we were and from looking at the map we could see our only means of finding an entrance would be to circumnavigate the area and whichever way we took would lead us up further with no guarantee we wouldn’t pick the wrong direction of travel first or that the place was even open. We stood in the shade of a tree, looked at one another, realised we were too hot, too exhausted, and too much in need of just having a sit down somewhere cool where we could replenish fluids.

Bollocks to all this, we thought, and we started to head back the way we’d come as we’d passed a large number of bars and cafés getting here. Some were quite busy so we ignored them but almost at the top of the steps we’d climbed was a place called Slide On 79. It was open, it was empty, it was perfect. We entered, asked for some locally-produced beer (we always try the local stuff when we travel), and sat down to cool down. Mentioning that we were sweltering, the barman then ramped the air conditioning up to full just for us. Bliss.

Was the beer cold? Oh yes! Was the beer good? Not really. Was the beer priced at around the mark where someone from Iceland might wonder if they were being ripped off? Yes. Didn’t matter, though, because it was so, so, so needed.

Drinks imbibed, inner temperature approaching normal for us, we headed back down the steps, our intention now being to see whether we could find anything souvenir-wise for either ourselves or family. We knew there were enough market stalls on our route and that we’d need to pass back through the large mall near the ferry piers so figured there would be plenty of opportunities here.

One thing I was very pleased to see as we descended was a photoshoot taking place featuring a young Hong Kong girl modelling some decidedly gothic fashion. I had to grab a picture for myself, naturally.

With significantly less effort involved making our way down as opposed to up I had time to take in our surroundings and could notice for the first time the very modern designs of the buildings on Hong Kong Island when compared to the mainland. A clear sign of where the investment was directed.

Star Ferry From Hong Kong Island

Back at the pier it was a simple matter to repeat the process of purchasing some tokens and boarding the next Star Ferry that arrived, then enjoying once again the quick trip across the harbour, this time towards the mainland.

Our loose, evolving “plan” was now to hit a few other areas that might afford shopping opportunities before making our way back to the cruise ship. We took stock of our surroundings on debarking the ferry, though, to take some last looks across the harbour and to observe the 1915-constructed, 44-metres high Former Kowloon-Canton Railway Clock Tower, a landmark it’s possible to climb. We didn’t, though.

Hong Kong Streets

By this point we’d spent the best part of six hours ashore in Hong Kong, walking for most of it. While we had time to spare and a desire to get some more shopping in if we could as well as just see if anything else caught our eyes we also wanted to head generally towards an MTR station that could get us back to where we’d be able to make our way to the cruise ship. The nearest station on the right line for us was Tsim Sha Tsui so we headed up Nathan Road and just past it then started exploring the side roads off from there. Many shops were visited, several things were purchased, and some photos were snapped at irregular intervals.

In the final post from our day in Hong Kong I cover our minor adventure getting back to the cruise ship and our evening departure from the city.

Getting Back To The Kai Tak Cruise Terminal

As we’d left the Kai Tak Cruise Terminal earlier in the day we’d been advised of a couple of differences in what had been described to us before regarding where and when we could get a shuttle bus back to the terminal. The terminal itself is several kilometres away from the main areas of Hong Kong that any first-time visitor might want to see and there was no free, direct way to reach the city. Instead, shuttle buses were provided that would allegedly drop us off and pick us up from one of two MTR stations: Diamond Hill or Kwun Tong. We hadn’t wanted to go to Kwun Tong at all as it was in the wrong direction but our option to choose otherwise had been removed immediately as there were no early shuttles to Diamond Hill. Thus it was that in the morning we’d taken the bus to Kwun Tong then hopped on the MTR to the city. No problem. However, by the time we were thinking about returning from the city in the evening we knew from what had been said to us at the cruise terminal that the Kwun Tong shuttle bus was not running any longer so our only option this time was to make for Diamond Hill. We didn’t think this would be an issue.

With our random exploring and shopping in Hong Kong finished and our feet sending all the right complaining noises to our brains we hopped back on an MTR train at Tsim Sha Tsui station and set off for Diamond Hill. The Hong Kong trains are clean, handy, easy-to-use, but could be slightly more helpful when trying to spend small amounts of money (see the first part for more on that). What we really liked about them, though, was the illuminated station indicator map in each carriage. You can see this in the photo below which shows what line we’re on, which direction we’re travelling, and what the next station is.

We got off at Diamond Hill and decided to take a look around before locating the shuttle bus as we’d been told that there was a shopping mall there. This was true and the mall was called Plaza Hollywood. Having had a fruitless search for just the right type of white jade in Hong Kong we had one more hunt here but ended up drawing a blank again. A quite nice touch, though, was an area set up for cruise passengers on the first floor level; upon production of our cruise card we were handed some vouchers, a map, and a can of a slightly fizzy lemon drink. We gratefully took all of these.

All that remained was for us to get the shuttle bus back to the cruise terminal but here is where we ran into a problem. Beneath the shopping mall was a huge, underground bus terminal area through which anywhere up to a dozen buses could pull in, park up, pick up passengers, and drive off. After 15 or more minutes of exploring this area we couldn’t work out where the shuttle bus might be nor could we see anyone who looked like they might be cruise passengers waiting. The problem, of course, was that we’d not been dropped off at Diamond Hill and so didn’t know where the pick-up point was. It could have been outside so we went wandering there too but, again, saw nothing that looked like another passenger or anything remotely Princess Cruises-related or just cruise-related in general. We popped back to the area set up for cruise passengers in the mall to ask them but only got a shrug and a “It’ll be where the bus dropped you off” reply. Not helpful.

We still had plenty of time to be back onboard so there was no panic and we decided to loop around again in search of anything that looked like a shuttle bus. This time we spotted a couple, one of whom had a Princess tote bag on her. Perfect, we thought. Not so fast. It turned out that they were in exactly the same position as us having been dropped off at one MTR station and having no idea where the bus would be for the other. They’d been surreptitiously following us for a while hoping we knew where we were going. We teamed up for one last hunt before I finally said that we may as well just share a taxi as we’d seen a rank near all the bus stops.

And so it was that on a day in which we’d ridden by bus, train, and ferry we then added to the list of modes of transport with a taxi ride too. An important thing to note here is that even though you’ll find all the signs in English throughout Hong Kong that’s no guarantee that someone you bump into will speak the language. If you think you might need a taxi then ensure you’ve got some way to indicate where you want to go in the native language and some local currency. Fortunately for us, we had both and were able to point out the phrase “Take me to the Kai Tak cruise terminal” on the paperwork provided by Princess Cruises the night before. The taxis in Hong Kong all have detailed information explaining the standing charge and cost per unit of distance in them and it was clear to see that these tallied up precisely with what was showing on the meter as we drove off. Just as with the train and the ferry the cost for our taxi ride was laughingly small and we remarked at the end of the day that we’d managed to take two train journeys, two ferry journeys, and a taxi ride for the pair of us over a far greater distance and for less money than it would cost just one of us to use the bus and visit the in-laws at home.

Sunset In Hong Kong

Back on Diamond Princess we offloaded what we’d bought in the city, freshened up, and enjoyed the sky growing duskier as the sun set through the distant haze.

When we’d visited Hong Kong in 2008 we’d been lucky enough to have a cruise past the city skyline overnight during its famous light show. There was no opportunity to do that this time although as the sky darkened we could see the lights on the skyscrapers going through their motions from a distance. You can see photos and video of our earlier experience here: Hong Kong Harbour Light Show.

When Diamond Princess finally cast off from the Kai Tak Cruise Terminal and made her way out to the open sea once more it was a decidedly serene affair.

Food And Drink

Finally, some of the food and drink with which we ended the long day in Hong Kong.

Conclusion

We’ve never not enjoyed ourselves in a port on a cruise and Hong Kong on this occasion was no exception but we learned an important lesson on this trip regarding researching more, picking things to do, and paying attention to map scales and opening times of locations. Some people are probably completely happy to just see what happens when they visit somewhere and we might be as well if that place was very familiar to us or reasonably close to home so that repeat trips wouldn’t be too much trouble; when you’re travelling to the other side of the world, though, then, for us, it’s important to know what you can do and what you really want to do otherwise you end up wasting time you could be spending on things of interest.

Following another day at sea our next stop would be the penultimate one on the cruise, visiting Taiwan. That would be a more organised day even though, like Hong Kong, it was a port we’d visited before.